4 ms·

They did: https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/an-update-on-market-volatility https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/an-update-on-marke... But the con

They did: https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/an-update-on-market-volatility https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/an-update-on-marke... But the conspiracy theories are more fun, so nobody really paid attention.

dawnerd 6y ago
That's still very vague. They had a chance to educate people, but nah can't do that.
CrazyStat 6y ago
That was their second post of the day. Their first post [1] made no mention of liquidity or clearinghouse deposit requirements, but rather framed the decision entirely in terms of "helping" customers deal with volatility. That post was at best misleading. [1] https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/keeping-customers-informed-through-market-volatility https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/keeping-customers-...
- Igelau 6y ago
  The first one looks like a form letter that they had on deck for "we need to stop trading right now" situations and they just plugged in the list of symbols. The second one is the more adequate explanation for when there was time to get actual humans involved.
- kahrl 6y ago
  It was a lie.
pinko 6y ago
That blog post was much more vague, and harder to understand than the clear explanation two comments above. I can now see that they're obliquely referencing their collateral requirements, but that wouldn't have been clear to me before reading JumpCrisscross's comment. I think g9yuayon's point stands.
g9yuayon 6y ago
Yeah, you're right. I think this article lacks specifics, but they did mention capital requirements. I was referring to their previous blog entry: https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/keeping-customers-informed-through-market-volatility https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/keeping-customers-.... In addition, their founder @VLAD on Twitter cited misinformation as a reason. As for conspiracy, I'd venture to guess that inconsistencies/hypocrisies and opacity turned people into cynics. I'm not saying RH is hypocritical, by the way. Instead, the hypocrisies of other platforms made people trust RH less. For instance, I saw numerous accusations that RH was helping wall street by limiting buying but not selling.
lopatin 6y ago
Correct me if I'm wrong, but that was at the end of the trading day, when people already made it clear their original BS blog post wasn't convincing anyone. IMO Robinhood is clearly in the wrong. It may not be as malignant as the Citadel collusion theory, but they did in fact treat their own customers like idiots. And it backfired.
- bostik 6y ago
  Not going to defend RH, but I have some insight with regards to corporate communications. A company in panic fire extuingisher mode has to put out some type of announcement. RH did. Twice in one day. I can believe the first one was a canned response, and the second one looks like a more thoughtful letter. But have you ever thought how much internal wrangling, or how many draft revisions even such a short piece has to go through? The company has to be very careful in what they say in their comms - plus even more cautious with their phrasing and wording used. These types of comms will be read by arms chair lawyers and real lawyers alike. The latter will look for opportunities. The former will read it like they were the devil's advocate themselves. Corporate comms teams have to put in a lot of effort, and go through numerous rapid iterations, to make sure their published material is factually accurate and anodyne. In a crisis situation, even more than usual.
exclusiv 6y ago
Well they sure made selling really easy during the architected dip. Why allow so many new users to buy those positions before they blocked buys if this was coming? I mean, the prices were elevated before it got to this. Seems like a situation of let's ride the free customer acquisition and figure it out later. They happily took the huge influx of new users that had no knowledge of this. And many got screwed. They couldn't average down on their position. And a ton of buyers were removed. So the price got out of control. Many panicked because of it. I'm not on RH but added more at 170 and it came with several partial fills of 1 and 2 stocks. That was RH users getting screwed as a ton of buyers were removed. Trading was not halted on the downward spiral. They could have said - hey guess what - 750k RH users (whatever it is) that own GME cannot buy this stock, so consider this before you sell. Some kind of warning that passed the attorneys. How could they not see this coming? Any way it went down - RH is done. I hope they "pivot" into a worse situation.
Miner49er 6y ago
This came out after the market closed, but the limitations were put in place before the market even opened. Plus, they never give a reason in this. They make vague references to things that could be a reason, but don't clearly state what the reason was. Leaving it unclear like this is horrible PR, and will continue to let the conspiracies spread.

dawnerd 6y ago

That's still very vague. They had a chance to educate people, but nah can't do that.

CrazyStat 6y ago

That was their second post of the day. Their first post [1] made no mention of liquidity or clearinghouse deposit requirements, but rather framed the decision entirely in terms of "helping" customers deal with volatility. That post was at best misleading. [1] https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/keeping-customers-informed-through-market-volatility https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/keeping-customers-...

Igelau 6y ago
The first one looks like a form letter that they had on deck for "we need to stop trading right now" situations and they just plugged in the list of symbols. The second one is the more adequate explanation for when there was time to get actual humans involved.
kahrl 6y ago
It was a lie.

pinko 6y ago

That blog post was much more vague, and harder to understand than the clear explanation two comments above. I can now see that they're obliquely referencing their collateral requirements, but that wouldn't have been clear to me before reading JumpCrisscross's comment. I think g9yuayon's point stands.

g9yuayon 6y ago

Yeah, you're right. I think this article lacks specifics, but they did mention capital requirements. I was referring to their previous blog entry: https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/keeping-customers-informed-through-market-volatility https://blog.robinhood.com/news/2021/1/28/keeping-customers-.... In addition, their founder @VLAD on Twitter cited misinformation as a reason. As for conspiracy, I'd venture to guess that inconsistencies/hypocrisies and opacity turned people into cynics. I'm not saying RH is hypocritical, by the way. Instead, the hypocrisies of other platforms made people trust RH less. For instance, I saw numerous accusations that RH was helping wall street by limiting buying but not selling.

lopatin 6y ago

Correct me if I'm wrong, but that was at the end of the trading day, when people already made it clear their original BS blog post wasn't convincing anyone. IMO Robinhood is clearly in the wrong. It may not be as malignant as the Citadel collusion theory, but they did in fact treat their own customers like idiots. And it backfired.

bostik 6y ago
Not going to defend RH, but I have some insight with regards to corporate communications. A company in panic fire extuingisher mode has to put out some type of announcement. RH did. Twice in one day. I can believe the first one was a canned response, and the second one looks like a more thoughtful letter. But have you ever thought how much internal wrangling, or how many draft revisions even such a short piece has to go through? The company has to be very careful in what they say in their comms - plus even more cautious with their phrasing and wording used. These types of comms will be read by arms chair lawyers and real lawyers alike. The latter will look for opportunities. The former will read it like they were the devil's advocate themselves. Corporate comms teams have to put in a lot of effort, and go through numerous rapid iterations, to make sure their published material is factually accurate and anodyne. In a crisis situation, even more than usual.

exclusiv 6y ago

Well they sure made selling really easy during the architected dip. Why allow so many new users to buy those positions before they blocked buys if this was coming? I mean, the prices were elevated before it got to this. Seems like a situation of let's ride the free customer acquisition and figure it out later. They happily took the huge influx of new users that had no knowledge of this. And many got screwed. They couldn't average down on their position. And a ton of buyers were removed. So the price got out of control. Many panicked because of it. I'm not on RH but added more at 170 and it came with several partial fills of 1 and 2 stocks. That was RH users getting screwed as a ton of buyers were removed. Trading was not halted on the downward spiral. They could have said - hey guess what - 750k RH users (whatever it is) that own GME cannot buy this stock, so consider this before you sell. Some kind of warning that passed the attorneys. How could they not see this coming? Any way it went down - RH is done. I hope they "pivot" into a worse situation.

Miner49er 6y ago

This came out after the market closed, but the limitations were put in place before the market even opened. Plus, they never give a reason in this. They make vague references to things that could be a reason, but don't clearly state what the reason was. Leaving it unclear like this is horrible PR, and will continue to let the conspiracies spread.