This Redditor took out $76,000 in loans to trade meme stocks thanks to hype on W...
source link: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/redditor-took-76-000-loans-090000259.html
Go to the source link to view the article. You can view the picture content, updated content and better typesetting reading experience. If the link is broken, please click the button below to view the snapshot at that time.
This Redditor took out $76,000 in loans to trade meme stocks thanks to hype on Wall Street Bets. It became an 'addiction' and he even lost $6,000 of his girlfriend's money.
CEO of overstock.com,
A Reddit user took out $76,672 in loans to trade meme stocks and lost nearly all of it.
Aaron says he felt addicted to trading after using the subreddit, styled as r/wallstreetbets.
He's now left with monthly repayments that eat up more than half his income.
A member of the Reddit group that fueled the Gamestop stock chaos took out $75,000 in loans and says he was addicted to trading meme stocks — even losing $6,000 lent to him by his girlfriend.
Aaron, a software engineer from Munich, took out tens of thousands of dollars in loans to trade stocks. He said was driven by chatter on the Wall Street Bets subreddit, styled as r/wallstreetbets and also known as WSB, which pushed him into investing sums he couldn't afford for fear of missing out on big returns.
Aaron, 29, is using a pseudonym as he doesn't want his family to find out about his losses.
"It was like an addiction because you have this community and they always post," he told Insider.
"And then you see 'Oh, there's a next big thing,' and then you are like, 'I have to get money and I have to invest it or else I will miss out on this big chance.'"
Despite making $4,000 at the start, Aaron quickly saw his finances fall into a black hole.
He took out five loans for a total of 71,000 euros ($76,672) between December 2020 and September 2021 to help him invest in meme stocks — stocks with low value that gain hype through social media, driving up their value — like Bed Bath & Beyond. His biggest one-off loan was for 20,000 euros, or about $21,488.
Insider verified this information with documents shared by Aaron.
He would also bet thousands at a time on companies like Tesla and trade options, which allow traders to supercharge their investment via leverage, putting in more than they can afford.
WallStreetBets and meme stocks
Aaron is one of millions of members of Wall Street Bets. The subreddit shot to fame in 2021 when it made some retail traders into millionaires while bankrupting others, often through trading meme stocks in "short squeezes."
Recommend
About Joyk
Aggregate valuable and interesting links.
Joyk means Joy of geeK