Here's a hard one: Imagine you're a senior executive at Morgan Stanley and your retail trading platform, E*Trade, is having a fine quarter, and suddenly the king of the meme stocks—Roaring Kitty, a.k.a. Keith Gill—turns up after a three-year absence. His return will mean a big surge in revenue thanks to the trading volume that Gill and his groupies will bring, but also potential headaches in the form of bad press and scrutiny from regulators. What do you do? Do you boot Roaring Kitty from E*Trade, or just look on as he sets off a series of buying frenzies in GameStop and God knows what else?
This is no imaginary scenario. On Monday, the Wall Street Journal reported that execs are fretting about the considerable sway Roaring Kitty and his followers can have on the market: "At E*Trade and its owner Morgan Stanley, that power created concerns he can pump up a stock for his own benefit. Their debate includes whether his actions amounted to manipulation and whether or not the firm is willing to risk drawing the attention of his meme army by removing him."
