Michael Burry, portrayed by Christian Bale in The Big Short, has made an eye-watering $270 million USD by trading Gamestop (GME) shares.
For most people the face of Christian Bale, if anything, will be what comes to mind when they hear the name Michael Burry. Despite this, he is a pretty fascinating individual in his own right. Burry is a hedge fund manager that made huge amounts of money in 2008 by predicting the crash of the American housing market. While his stock, at least in terms of publicity, has been pretty quiet since, he has just been recently pushed back into the spotlight. It’s even possible he will be portrayed in another film.
One of the more interesting things to come out in the chaos of Gamestonk is that Burry was a big stakeholder. However, he wasn’t part of the group that invested their savings on the advice of an internet forum. Burry purchased almost $17 million USD worth of GME stock in 2019, well before any of the recent shenanigans started.
As an individual with a vested interest, he reportedly offered advice to the GameStop board. In January 2020, on Burry’s recommendation, the board bought back just under $200 million USD worth of their own shares. This large and visible buyback is likely what turned the heads of so many investors, from the hedge funds and Reddit forums alike.
While possibly unforeseen by Bury himself, it appears that this started the process that resulted in his investment rising by roughly $253 million USD.
While Burry has acknowledged how well he has done out of this investment, he has been keen to downplay his involvement in the recent developments. In a since-deleted tweet he expressed that, while happy for anyone who did well, this whole situation is “unnatural, insane, and dangerous”.
This cynical soothsayer persona he is exhibiting is certainly keeping in character, or at least how he was depicted in The Big Short. And if some of his past predictions are anything to go by, then everyone should continue watching this space to see how things develop.
The times they are a changin’, but Gamestonk and all of its repercussions don’t seem to be fading away.
