Robinhood popularity takes a hit after meme stock fad fades

Activity on stock trading app Robinhood plunged during the third quarter of this year, a development that may be connected to the end of the meme stock fad.

Why should we care?
Research from JPMorgan Chase claims that Robinhood’s metrics of active users and app downloads plunged during the third quarter. New downloads were down 78% from the second quarter, and daily active users went down 40% during the period, the report said. Robinhood, which went public in July, may face a more than 20% drop in share prices by the end of the year, according to JPMorgan Chase analysts. In a shot across the bow to a company that sees itself on a mission to democratize markets, analysts at JPMorgan Chase said they “question the ability of the company to generate competitive margins.” In an op-ed this week in The Wall Street Journal, Vlad Tenev, CEO and co-founder of Robinhood, defended the company’s actions, including the controversial practice of payment for order flow. “One wonders whether the push to ban payment for order flow and overregulate modern design is about investor protection or really about control,” he wrote, suggesting that tighter regulation could impact retail investors who were previously “shut out” of investing.