Jan 28, 2026
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Looking for deeper insight into markets? In tonight’s Closer sent to Bespoke Institutional clients, we lead off with a quick recap of today’s FOMC meeting (page 1) followed by a review of the big earnings slate (pages 1 – 3). We then close out with some notes on Brazilian financing (page 4).
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Jan 27, 2026
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Looking for deeper insight into markets? In tonight’s Closer sent to Bespoke Institutional clients, we begin with a recap of some of the latest earnings and the pain in managed care stocks (page 1). We then review the new low and bad day for the dollar (page 2) including a look at performance when it hits a 52-week long alongside a 52-week high in US equities (page 3). We then round out tonight’s note with an update on Case-Shiller home prices, consumer confidence, and regional Fed manufacturing gauges (page 4).
See today’s full post-market Closer and everything else Bespoke publishes by starting a 14-day trial to Bespoke Institutional today!
Jan 27, 2026
It has now been five years since the height of meme-stock mania. In January 2021, there was a surge in buying of crypto and NFTs, but perhaps the most in-vogue assets at the time were extremely high short interest names like GameStop (GME) and AMC Entertainment (AMC). These two stocks experienced enormous short squeezes led by the Reddit message board r/wallstreetbets. Remember Roaring Kitty?
Before the first month of 2021 ended, both GME and AMC were ten baggers.
As shown below, the years since haven’t seen these stocks hold onto gains. GameStop (GME) is still firmly in the green since the end of 2020 (with a gain of more than 400%), but it’s well off its peak from January 2021. Meanwhile, AMC is down 99% from its all-time highs and closely 90% since the end of 2020.
The index below from UBS tracks the 100 most highly shorted stocks with market caps above $1 billion and includes a monthly rebalancing. After shooting higher in January 2021, these stocks fell hard in the back half of 2021 and then plunged during the bear market of 2022. With that said, the index bottomed in late 2023 and has been on its way upwards ever since.
In the chart below, we show the individual performance of Russell 3,000 stocks since the peak of meme-stock mania on 1/27/21. Some of the most notorious meme stocks in early 2021 like AMC, BBBY, and GME are among the index’s worst performers since then. While opportunities for short squeezes may always be present, sometimes heavily shorted names are being bet against for good reason.
So which stocks have been the biggest winners in the five years since the peak of meme-stock mania? As you might expect, the emergence of AI means that among the biggest winners are AI headliners such as NVIDIA (NVDA), Comfort Systems (FIX), and Sandisk (SNDK); all up more than 1,000%.
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