Ben Gilbert / Business Insider
- Robinhood removed GameStop, AMC, BlackBerry and Nokia from its trading platform before the market opened on Thursday.
- The brokers told clients that they could still close positions in the volatile stocks, but that they could not buy any more stocks.
- The move comes after traders on Reddit forums furiously offered the shares in an unprecedented short amount of time.
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Robinhood removed GameStop, AMC, BlackBerry and Nokia from its trading platform on Thursday and investors were unable to buy the strongly volatile shares.
The discount brokerage has informed clients that they can close positions in the shares in question, but cannot buy additional shares, according to numerous screenshots shared on Twitter. The move came before markets opened Thursday.
The shares that have been removed have risen in recent trading sessions as day traders united in Reddit forums like WallStreetBets are buying the names wildly to make their share prices rise higher. The phenomenon has already fueled huge losses for numerous hedge funds and attracted the attention of regulators and the White House.
Robinhood did not respond to a request for comment.
Robinhood’s move follows similar freezes set by Charles Schwab and TD Ameritrade on Wednesday. Extraordinary trading volumes also caused service disruptions in several brokers as investors rushed to the heavily shorted stocks.
Check back soon for updates.
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