Elon Musk Grills Robinhood CEO Over GameStop Trading Freeze: 'The People Demand Answers'

Elon Musk had just wrapped up a wide-ranging 90-minute interview on the audio chat app Clubhouse early on Monday, when he threw the hosts a curveball. "Do you want to hear the real story from Vlad [from] Robinhood about what happened on the Street with GameStop?" Musk asked. He advised the moderators to click on Robinhood CEO Vladimir Tenev so he could talk. From a report: That's when Musk launched into a torrent of questions, a CEO-to-CEO showdown over why the popular trading app had halted trading on the market's hottest stocks at one point last week. "Spill the beans, man," Musk said to Tenev, whom the Tesla CEO introduced as "Vlad the stock impaler." "What happened last week? Why couldn't people buy the GameStop shares? The people demand answers, and they want to know the truth." Musk, who has come under fire for quality control issues, business missteps and personal behaviors, asked Tenev what caused him to halt trades on GameStop and other heavily shorted stocks last week. Were more powerful entities, such as regulators, depriving smaller retail investors of a potential payday at the expense of shadowy hedge funds? Was Robinhood partner Citadel Securities responsible for the trading halt? "Is anyone holding you hostage right now?" Musk asked. [...] "If you had no choice, that's understandable, but then we got to find out why you have no choice," Musk said. "And who are these people that are saying you have no choice?" In response, Tenev suggested more transparency was needed in the formulas used by financial institutions to calculate these requirements. He emphasized how Robinhood was able to raise more than $1 billion in capital in 24 hours to reopen on Monday. Tenev would not commit to imposing no restrictions on the stocks.

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