Category Archives: Uncategorized

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: February 3, 2021 ~ There is recent evidence that the U.S. is already seeing capital flight. According to a January 24 report from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, China beat out the U.S. in foreign direct investment inflows last year, receiving $163 billion versus $134 billion for the U.S. That was a radical change from 2019 when the U.S. received $251 billion in foreign direct investment versus $140 billion for China. Capital flight could accelerate this year if the craziness in Congress and Wall Street continues. Just ask yourself this, would you want to invest in a country that had scenes of a bloody attempted coup of the government featured on the front pages of newspapers around the world? Would you want to risk your savings in a stock market that has ceased to perform its two key functions: a pricing … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: February 2, 2021 ~ Politico reported yesterday that the House Financial Services Committee plans to call Vlad Tenev to testify on February 18. That’s the CEO of the online trading app known as Robinhood that has played a role in the controversy surrounding the bull raid (now turned bear raid) in the shares of GameStop. If that’s to be the only witness, you might as well call Ken Griffin’s personal shopper to testify. Griffin is the billionaire founder, CEO and majority owner of Citadel, which has been operating in the GameStop saga like a maestro from an orchestra pit. (For our previous profile of Griffin and Citadel, see here.) As Melvin Capital, a major short seller in the shares of GameStop was about to collapse as the stock soared, Griffin and Citadel’s hedge fund rode to the rescue, injecting $2 billion in cash into Melvin … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: February 1, 2021 ~ When it comes to the shares of GameStop, most of the mainstream media’s focus has been on the Reddit message board commentators who stood to make millions of dollars from boosting the stock price. It’s a good bet that the SEC, FBI, Financial Stability Oversight Council, Senate and House investigators are setting their sights on those who stood to make…not millions but billions. The overarching question will be: did any of the big players engage in a direct role on Reddit or incentivize the people posting on the Reddit message board, WallStreetBets, to hawk the shares of GameStop. It’s very clear from the volume of trading in GameStop that amateur traders are not the major movers of this stock. The stock has gone from trading less than 13 million shares a day in November to over 150 million shares per … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: January 30, 2021 ~ Yesterday evening, CNN’s Erin Burnett told millions of viewers that it was “amateur traders” who had taken on the powerful Wall Street hedge funds to pump up the share price of GameStop. The New York Post also called Keith Gill, the man who initiated the frenzy in GameStop shares, an “amateur investor.” This characterization of Gill fits with the broader mainstream media narrative that this is an exciting David versus Goliath story. Unfortunately, the facts keep getting in the way of that narrative. Wall Street On Parade has confirmed that Keith Patrick Gill, a man holding highly sophisticated licenses to trade and supervise others on Wall Street, is the same man using multiple identities to promote GameStop on social media platforms. Gill, and a member of his family, have confirmed to other media outlets that Gill used the identity of … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens: January 29, 2021 ~ The Wall Street Journal has an article up naming Keith Gill as the fellow that started the GameStop mania at WallStreetBets. The article says that Gill “until recently worked in marketing for Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co.” According to FINRA’s BrokerCheck, a Keith Patrick Gill, employed at a subsidiary of Massachusetts Mutual, MML Investor Services, has held trading licenses since 2012 and got his Series 7 stock trading license in 2016. On November 1, 2016, FINRA shows that Gill received his Series 24 Principal’s license, making him eligible to supervise other licensed brokers. FINRA also shows that Gill has worked for three trading houses since 2012. Could there be two Keith Gills working for MassMutual? Yes there could. But it would certainly behoove the Wall Street Journal reporters to revisit their reporting. If the guy who started the GameStop mania has passed a multitude … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: January 29, 2021 ~ According to JPMorgan Chase’s 13F filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, it moved from a net short position in GameStop shares as of December 31, 2019 to a big long position as of September 30, 2020, the date of its last 13F filing. As of the end of the third quarter of last year, JPMorgan Chase was long (owned) 368,196 shares of GameStop versus a put (short position) on a meager 19,300 shares. At the close of trading on September 30, 2020, GameStop was a $10.20 stock, making JPMorgan’s long position worth $3.8 million. At the intraday high yesterday, GameStop was a $483 stock. If JPMorgan had sold at the top, it would have made approximately $174 million on its long position versus where it was trading four months earlier. We’re dismissing what happened to the put that JPMorgan … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: January 28, 2021 ~ Dark Pools owned by the biggest names on Wall Street – such as Goldman Sachs’ Sigma X2, JPMorgan Chase’s JPM-X, UBS’ UBSA, Morgan Stanley’s MSPL, and Credit Suisse’s Crossfinder — have been making tens of thousands of trades in the shares of GameStop on an ongoing weekly basis.  FINRA, Wall Street’s highly compromised self-regulator, reports the Dark Pool data on a stale basis, two to three weeks after the trading has occurred. It is then lumped together for the whole week, rendering it useless in terms of monitoring price manipulation. The chart above is taken from the latest available information from FINRA. (See our previous reporting on Dark Pools in Related Articles below.) It’s a fair guess that you haven’t heard a peep about Dark Pools on the evening news. The fact that you haven’t is a perfect commentary on … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: January 27, 2021 ~ Jay Clayton is the man who served for almost all of the four years of the Trump administration as Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission; who attempted a failed coup to take over as the top criminal prosecutor in Manhattan; and who had represented 8 out of 10 of the mega Wall Street banks in the three years prior to arriving at the SEC. Clayton came to the SEC as a law partner at Sullivan & Cromwell where he had worked for more than two decades. Sullivan & Cromwell is a law firm that has been serving Wall Street’s interests since the birth of Wall Street. Below we describe the condition in which Clayton has left what used to be considered the most respected markets in the world. Bitcoin: Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency backed by nothing more substantial than … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: January 26, 2021 ~ The chart above reminded us of what happened in the London Whale saga at JPMorgan Chase. The London derivatives traders at JPMorgan Chase were making such huge bets in a specific credit index that they effectively became the market with no escape route to unwind their losing trades. The bank had, insanely, used customer deposits to make those wild bets and ended up losing at least $6.2 billion. Since August 6 of last year, the Fed has purchased $400 billion of U.S. Treasury notes and bonds. Despite that massive amount of propping up the market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury has more than doubled, from half of one percent to a yield of 1.05 percent at 7:30 a.m. this morning. That means that all of those billions of dollars in Treasuries that the Fed bought at lower yields are … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: January 24, 2021 ~  Haven’t we learned anything about properly vetting people for the highest offices in the U.S. government? Former Fed Chair and Treasury Secretary nominee Janet Yellen has failed to report the details of millions of dollars in fees that she earned in 2018, the year she stepped down as Fed Chair, as she went on a whirlwind of speaking engagements in foreign cities around the world. Yellen’s “leadership” role with the Bloomberg New Economy Forums which had the “active participation and support” of an organization openly tied to the Chinese Communist Party, raises further serious red flags. And yet, Yellen sailed through her Senate Finance Committee confirmation hearing this past week, gaining a favorable vote of 26-0. A full Senate vote to confirm Yellen as Treasury Secretary is expected to occur tomorrow. What Yellen did disclose on her Office of Government … Continue reading →