Tesla chief Elon Musk accused the Discord group chat app of “becoming a body” after banning a Reddit group that sparked a major recovery on Gamestop, AMC and other previously unloved actions.
WallStreetBets, a Reddit chat room for retail investors, was purged from the Discord gaming messaging service this week amid a huge surge in heavily shorted stocks that hit billionaire hedge fund managers.
“Even Discord became a body …” Musk tweeted.
On Thursday, Discord denied that WallStreetBets – whose members relied on Discord to chat in real time – had been banned for financial reasons, but instead for “continuing to allow hateful and discriminatory content after repeated warnings”.
Discord said WallStreetBets had been on his radar “for some time” due to content violations and issued several warnings before banning it.
Millions of new members flocked to the Reddit page of WallStreetBets in the past few days after Musk posted a link to the group on Twitter on Tuesday, writing: ‘Gamestonk !!’
In his Discord tweet, Musk, 49, made reference to the Cyberpunk 2077 video game, in which players choose three ‘life paths’ for their character: Body, Streekid or Nomad, with Bodies associated with relentless commercialism.
One of Musk’s Twitter followers asked if he was Streekid or Nomad. He replied: “Nomad”, a clan that values the family above all.
“Discord welcomes a wide range of discussions on personal finance, from investment clubs and day traders to university students and professional financial advisers,” said the company in its statement. “We are monitoring this situation and if there are reports of illegal activities, we will cooperate with the authorities as appropriate.”
During its epic recovery, GameStop’s stock soared more than 1,700%. After the shopping frenzy on Wednesday, brokers such as Schwab, TD Ameritrade and Robinhood limited trading on GameStop, AMC and other actions promoted by members of WallStreetBets.
Since the frenzy of stock trading, the White House and the Securities and Exchange Commission have been monitoring the situation.
Two years ago, Musk was in the sights of the SEC after his online activity wreaked havoc on the markets.
He was fined $ 40 million after tweeting he could close Tesla for $ 420 a share – a substantial premium on the negotiation price – which Musk denied having been inspired by a marijuana joke.