Steven Cohen reassures Mets fans about involvement in GameStop action frenzy



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The actions of video game retailer GameStop (GME) are on a wild roller coaster ride, fueled by the geeks of retail traders on Reddit – and newly formed New York Mets owner Steven A. Cohen is obscurely involved.

GameStop shares rose more than 50% last Friday after Reddit WallStreetBets (WSB) forum users rallied to buy the stock in response to a number of short calls, most notably from Lemon’s Andrew Left Research, who predicted the stock would drop. at $ 20. (GameStop isn’t the only one: AMC and BlackBerry are two of the other heavily sold stocks that retail investors boosted this week via social media.) On Monday, GameStop stock jumped 130%, then was shut down. and closed the day up 18%. As of noon on Wednesday, it rose 110% to $ 118. The title is up 630% since Friday.

Enter the Mets fans.

Steven Cohen, CEO of Point72 Asset Management, speaks at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills, California, United States, May 2, 2016. REUTERS / Lucy Nicholson
Steven Cohen, CEO of Point72 Asset Management, speaks at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills, California, United States, May 2, 2016. REUTERS / Lucy Nicholson

As the Financial Times reported on Monday, Cohen Point72’s hedge fund has just joined Ken Griffin’s Citadel by investing $ 2.75 billion in Melvin Capital, the hedge fund of Gabe Plotkin, a former protégé of Cohen. Melvin is having a terrible January (double-digit percentage losses, according to the FT) that just got worse: this is one of the funds with a big short position on GameStop.

Cohen’s Point72, which had previously invested $ 1 billion in Melvin, added $ 750 million to Citadel’s $ 2 billion, and now owns a significant non-controlling interest in Melvin.

Mets fans are worried about this. Could the short GameStop squeeze that hit Melvin, and by extension Cohen, hurt the Mets’ payroll?

According to Cohen: No.

Tuesday evening, in the middle happy Twitter jokes about the toll WallStreetBets took on short sellers, hedge funds and possibly on Mets, Cohen appeared to take it all in stride: “Restless crowd on Twitter tonight,” he tweeted. “Hey, the jockeys keep bringing it.”

Cohen then responded directly to a Twitter user who asked him, “Does this Gamestop company affect Mets payroll?” I mean that’s the main story of it all.

Cohen replied, “Why would one have anything to do with the other.”

On Wednesday evening, the New York Times reported that Point72 was down 15% so far this year, in part because of its investment in Melvin Capital.

Still, Cohen is the richest owner in baseball, worth more than $ 14.5 billion, more than three times the net worth of Washington Nationals second richest owner Ted Lerner.

Cohen’s purchase of the Mets for $ 2.47 billion in November, in the midst of a global pandemic, set a new record for the selling price of any American professional sports team – and didn’t even include the team’s regional sports network, SNY. (If you ask Dodgers co-owner Alan Smolinisky, the purchase of Cohen’s Mets is the latest proof that the pandemic won’t distort the values ​​of the pro franchise: “It’s such a limited resource, and there are so many people who want to be part of it. ”)

Regardless of Cohen’s losses directly from the GameStop short squeeze hitting his former protégé’s hedge fund, Mr. Met doesn’t have to worry.

This story was updated on January 27 at 10:55 p.m. EST.

Daniel Roberts is a senior editor at Yahoo Finance and specializes in sports commerce. Follow him on Twitter at @readDanwrite.

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