Roaring Kitty is back, and GameStop stock is rallying. The company still is struggling to make money.

MW Roaring Kitty is back, and GameStop stock is rallying. The company still is struggling to make money.

By Steve Goldstein

Roaring Kitty is back.

Keith Gill, whose bullish analysis of the video-game retailer GameStop on Reddit during the pandemic created a national phenomenon, made his first social media post on the X service in three years, in a cryptic post meant to show he was paying attention.

"My god it's him, he's really back," said one user on Reddit's GameStop message board. "To give a hedgefund bitch a heart attack. To make a million apes insomniac. It's the guy... who's not a cat ;-)"

Gill famously declared he was not a cat, in testimony to the House Financial Services Committee, which examined the wild volatility in the stock.

GameStop shares $(GME)$ rose as high as $483 in the heady days of 2021, as chronicled in the movie Dumb Money, but have lost most of their meme allure. Yet the stock has been hurtling higher over the last month, rising nearly 70% from its April lows.

GameStop shares surged 22% in premarket trade on Monday.

Like last time, it seems like investors are betting against those who are shorting the stock. The short percentage of GameStop shares outstanding is 21%, according to S&P Capital IQ, though again that's well below the 140% at its 2021 peak.

GameStop did register its best earnings per share performance in three years in its fiscal fourth quarter ending Feb. 3, but didn't hold a conference call to discuss them.

Analysts expect GameStop to register an operating margin of just over 2% this fiscal year on a 4% sales decline. FactSet says there are only three analysts who cover the stock.

The company, which operates 2,915 stores in the U.S. and 1,254 overseas, is aiming to overhaul its business and become the "leading destination for games and entertainment products," competing against the likes of Walmart $(WMT)$, Target $(TGT)$ and Best Buy $(BBY)$.

Read: Meme-stock OG GameStop is sparking memories of the heady days of 2021

-Steve Goldstein

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May 13, 2024 04:12 ET (08:12 GMT)

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