By Mike Wishart
To quote another another source of misguided plunges into the stock market, “I don’t care if you’re Warren Buffett or if you’re Jimmy Buffett,” nobody can defeat the memes.
This is the harsh lesson that traditional Wall Street investors and hedge fund managers learned this past month with the GameStop short squeeze. Long story short, tons of Reddit users manipulated the stock price of GameStop to enormous heights (which GameStop really doesn’t deserve considering they gave me $20 for my PlayStation 2 in 2009), and then professional investors lost money. The Redditors did exactly what professional investors have been doing for years, but investors said it was unfair because the GameStop buyers don’t wear suits or do coke during the work day.
In this post-GameStop world, anybody with Robinhood downloaded on their phone claims to be an expert on the stock market. An impact that has pushed one Fairfield professor over the edge.
Dr. Von Whatnow began his Introduction to Macroeconomics class this past Monday in his traditional fashion. To keep students up to date with current events and help understand the application of what they are learning, Dr. Von Whatnow opens class by discussing the recent updates in the U.S. economy and stock market. He asked the class if there were any updates that the students had heard about and they would like to share.
That’s when chaos ensued.
“Dogecoin is going to the moon!” yelled somebody from the back of the classroom. Dr. Von Whatnow, who majored in business analytics and got his Ph.D. in market research, could not hide his confusion.
“I’m sorry, what was that?” Von Whatnow asked. Then another voice piped up.
“We gotta hold the line doc! Silly Bandz is going through the roof!”
Von Whatnow, now even more confused, replied “Silly bands?”
“Stonks! Daddy Elon just tweeted he likes Arizona iced tea so I used my tuition to buy all the Arizona stock I could. Also bought bonds from the state of Arizona just to be safe,” said one enterprising individual.
Von Whatnow, hoping to get the class back on track, announced “Why don’t we start today’s less-”
“Big League Chew Bubble Gum is making a push right now, we need all hands on deck!”
“Malcolm-In-The-Middle-Coin is catching fire over here guys! Gotta get in while you can!”
“Woo! Stonks baby! Let’s keep it rolling fellas! I just bought 50 shares of Kirkland Signature at $1 and now it’s up to $1.25. Let’s GOOOOOOO!”
Dr. Von Whatnow was at this point just mouthing the words that he wanted to say, a lone tear rolling down his cheek. He turned towards the door while the yelling from the students grew louder and louder.
“Stop saying stonks!” he shrieked, and the man with 30 years of market experience ran from the room while the new-age titans of industry continued their buying and selling. Dr. Von Whatnow has since submitted his resignation and is rumored to be wandering the Earth in the wake of this reversal of everything he thought he knew.
For more about unqualified financial advice, stay tuned to Stagnation. Also, if you can actually explain cryptocurrency to me, please contact us at 1-800-000-idek.
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