from Hacker News

GameStop CEO gets 170M-payday after Reddit market frenzy

by LonisHamaili on 4/27/21, 6:03 PM with 8 comments

• by real-dino on 4/27/21, 7:48 PM

  There is lot's of talk of a possible market crash when this all kicks off. Not as Reddit users are manipulating the game, but as hedge funds have rehypothecated up to 5x the float via naked sorting of ETFs, Dark Pools and options manipulation.

  Ultimately, the fact that there are more shares than possible seems not to stop them, and if/when any of the hedge funds get market called, the whole spiders web will be unraveled and we'll work out how many shares are out in the wild.

  The difference this time is that a company hedge-funds went 'all-in' on, turned around and became majorly successful.

  They call this the MOASS.

  No one knows just how many, but I am pretty sure it's more than the 71.5 million issued. That is what the bet is.

  Questions welcome. :-)

• by throwawaysea on 4/27/21, 7:02 PM

  TLDR - the CEO was granted 1 million shares over 3 years at $5 per share. Now that GameStop's stock price went up due to the WSB frenzy, that stock is worth $170 million. He is departing earlier than expected, and per his contract he retains those shares but gives up a cash payout and another $50M in shares he could have had if GameStop's performance improved over the next few years.