What happened
Shares of AMC Entertainment Holdings (AMC 8.22%) were rising 3.4% in morning trading Friday as meme stock traders rallied around their most popular shares, including GameStop and Bed Bath & Beyond.
The video game retailer seems to be the catalyst today (the home goods retailer's earnings report was yesterday's rallying point) after GameStop announced some definitive news on its entry into non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The retailer said it would be launching an NFT exchange for gamers by the end of the year.
While the move has been long expected, the realization of those plans, even if they're still in their early stages, was enough to send GameStop's shares soaring 10%.
Image source: Getty Images.
So what
There's still a lot of debate over whether NFTs have any real utility beyond certain specific niche areas, but they've caught on with traders who view the tokens as an evolutionary step in decentralized finance.
But meme stocks like AMC and GameStop don't need any real news to see their shares move by large amounts, as they trade more on internet stock board chatter than on business fundamentals. Combine the two, though, and you can get outsize gains like what is occurring with GameStop.
Now what
Yesterday traders tried to get AMC's stock moving by getting #AMCDay trending on social media, and for a while it worked as the theater operator's shares were trading up 4.5% on a no-news day. But the rally sputtered later on and AMC's stock closed down 1.2%
Today the stock seems to be rising in sympathy with GameStop, but it remains to be seen whether it can hold on to its gains.
