Roaring Kitty / Keith Gill

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Part of a series on WallStreetBets GameStop Short Squeeze. [View Related Entries]

About

Roaring Kitty, also known as u/DeepFuckingValue and whose real name is Keith Gill, is a streamer, financial analyst and content creator famous for his central role in the WallStreetBets GameStop Short Squeeze, as well as for his clout on the WallStreetBets Reddit community. He published an analysis of the GME (GameStop) stock in 2019, making an argument for its value and leading Redditors to hodl the stock as it became a viral sensation. Throughout 2020 and 2021, he continued to advance a pro-GameStop line of reasoning and helped to sustain the momentum of the WallStreetBets movement, becoming a major figurehead and spokesperson. Gill is also notable for aiding in the popularization of meme stocks in the 2020s.

Career

Keith Gill worked as a financial analyst and was a college track athlete prior to his career as an internet stonk meme lord.^[3] He joined Reddit on August 29th, 2019, becoming part of the WallStreetBets community. As of May 2024, Gill has over 204,000 post karma on Reddit under the username DeepFuckingValue.^[1] "Deep value" is a term in the financial markets that refers to stocks that are undervalued, which was Gill's hypothesis about GameStop (GME).

Gill published his first "GME YOLO" spreadsheet to /r/wallstreetbets on September 19th, 2019, describing a trade he had made, which received over 1,600 upvotes in five years (seen below).^[4]

On Reddit and other platforms, Gill defended his bet on GameStop, including in a January 2020 discussion (seen below) in which he pushed back on others who called him "crazy" for believing GameStop was a good stock and a sound business. Redditors later returned to the comment, marking it as proof of Gill's persistence.

From then on, every month, Keith Gill continued to update Redditors on the status of his investment. Gill also continued to post analyses under the username of Roaring Kitty to his YouTube channel, including the one below, posted on July 7th, 2020, summarizing his argument in favor of Gamestop, which received over 1.5 million views in the course of three years.^[2]

In frequent livestreams on his YouTube channel, Roaring Kitty discussed the value of GameStop and created a tight-knit community of investors and commenters who also bought into the stock.

Gamestop Short Squeeze

In early 2021, WallStreetBets trapped a group of hedge funds and investment banks in a short squeeze on GameStop. Gill's holdings (and those of other GameStop investors) saw a rapid and substantial rise.^[5]

On January 27th, 2021, Gill posted his spreadsheet for the GameStop bet, as he has done regularly since 2019. The post (seen below) showed Gill with over $33 million in profit and received over 217,000 upvotes in the course of four years.^[6]

The trading app Robinhood then paused trading on GameStop, purportedly in order to push back on the retail investors. This action sent the GameStop stock price tumbling downward since users could no longer purchase shares. On January 28th, Roaring Kitty posted his spreadsheet again, showing that he had continued to hold the stock despite taking a nearly $15 million loss (seen below). The post received over 299,000 upvotes over the course of four years.^[7]

Dumb Money Movie

On September 15th, 2023, a movie tiled Dumb Money was released that centered on Keith Gill (played by actor Paul Dano) and the story surrounding the events of the GameStop Short Squeeze (trailer seen below).

2024 Return

On May 12th, 2024, Roaring Kitty posted on Twitter / X after a lengthy hiatus of over three years. The post (seen below) was a Leaning Forward In Chair Diagram meme and received over 87,000 likes in 20 hours.^[8] The value of the GamStop stock promptly jumped by over 60 percent in the hours after Roaring Kitty's post.^[9]

Posters greeted Gill's return with enthusiasm. For example, @wallstreetbets (seen below) posted a "Lil Yachty Walking Onstage": meme featuring Gill dancing before a cheering crowd, earning over 16,000 likes on May 12th, 2024.^[10]

2024 Gamestop Position

On June 2nd, 2024, Gill posted to /r/Superstonk, a subreddit devoted to "theoretical discussions of Gamestop stock," showing his position on the stock (seen below). The post received over 99,000 upvotes and 21,000 upvotes in the course of twenty hours.^[11]

Gill had invested over $116 million dollars into Gamestop stock. In addition to this investment, Gill had a $65 million option bet set to expire on June 21st at a call price of $20 per stock, meaning that as long as the Gamestop stock stays above that price on June 21st, Gill will make a lot of money and the financial institution at the other end of the bet, who gambled that Gamestop would be worth less than $20, would lose money. On June 3rd, at close of trading, Gamestop was valued at $28 per stock, and Marketwatch estimated Gill's net worth to be over $400 million.^[12]

Online, fans of Roaring Kitty posted about the resurgence of interest in Gamestop. For example, @Gurgavin on X joined many others when they posted about Gill possibly becoming a billionaire, earning over 4,500 likes in less than a day on June 3rd (seen below).^[13]

Gill himself continued to post, throwing an Uno reverse card onto the scroll on June 3rd as well, possibly as a reference to his determination to hold onto the stock, earning over 74,000 likes in the course of 20 hours (seen below).^[14]

Online History

Roaring Kitty has maintained a YouTube presence since April 2015 and has over 600,000 followers as of May 2024.^[2] On X, where Roaring Kitty has maintained a presence since November 2014, he has over 780,000 followers as of May 2024.^[8] On Reddit as /u/DeepFuckingValue, Roaring Kitty has been a member since August 29th, 2019, around the time he formulated his theory about GameStop.

WallStreetBets

WallStreetBets or /r/wallstreetbets is a subreddit whose primary focus is risky stock market trading and memes about it. Similar to 4chan's /biz/ board, the subreddit spawned multiple memes about stock trading and has been featured in a number of mainstream financial outlets.

In January 2021, the subreddit achieved global recognition following the events of the GameStop Stock Surge in which it played a defining role.

WallStreetBets GameStop Short Squeeze

WallStreetBets GameStop Short Squeeze refers to the massive surge in the price of GameStop shares in the stock market in January 2021, when it rose from $17 to over $500, in a significant degree due to a campaign by users in the /r/WallStreetBets subreddit. The hype resulted in GameStop (GME) becoming one of the most traded stocks on Wall Street that month, with a massive number of retail investors buying the stock in an attempt to force hedge funds betting against it into large losses.

As GameStop stock garnered attention globally and became one of the most-discussed topics online in late January 2021, the events were followed by several movie announcements and many controversies, including restrictions on trading the stock imposed by several brokerages, and the stock market as a whole being put under government scrutiny.