WallStreetBets, the investor coalition that gained notoriety for promoting shares of its seat on Reddit, has been banned by communications platform Discord because they did not do enough to stem hate speech.
A Discord representative said on Wednesday that he had been monitoring the group for some time because he had violated community guidelines and had issued several warnings to the administrator of the so-called server – essentially a digital room where people could come together to chat.
The move was not linked to WallStreetBets’ efforts to buy shares such as GameStop Corp., the representative said. This was to allow ‘hateful and discriminatory content after repeated warnings’. Discord’s guidelines include hate speech, glorifying violence and spreading misinformation.
“Discord welcomes a wide range of personal finance discussions, from investment clubs and day traders to university students and professional financial advisers,” the spokesman said. “We are monitoring this situation and if there are allegations of illegal activity, we will cooperate with authorities as appropriate.”
The ban is a separate drama unfolded on Reddit, where WallStreetBets turned itself off to new users. Shortly after 6:30 p.m. in New York, the WallStreetBets homepage indicated that moderators had made the conversation private, meaning an invitation was required to enter. The site has attracted more than 3 million members and shares like GameStop and AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc., which results in stratospheric gains.
GameStop, a struggling video game retailer, is up 1,745% this year. AMC, a film chain that flirted with bankruptcy, scored 839%.
Elon Musk, the billionaire provocateur who has entertainment voiced over the WallStreetsBets phenomenon, tweeted its annoyance over the Discord move late Wednesday.
– With the help of Katherine Greifeld and Sarah Ponczek
(Updates with Musk tweet in the last paragraph)