By Anastasia Pumphrey
When Keith Gill was at Stonehill, he broke records as a star track and field runner. Now, the 2009 graduate is making global headlines due to his leadership in a stock market rally to help retailer GameStop and other declining stocks that has shed light on the power of the internet in 2021.
The campaign started on Reddit, where Gill, who graduated from Stonehill from 2009, known as “DeepF—ingValue,” was part of an effort to buy GameStop stock that was selling for $18 so that the price was driven higher.
Gill told The Wall Street Journal today that his intention was to support retail investors, not gain national and even international attention. The stock rose about 900% by yesterday, according to the WSJ.
Gill’s recent story has been covered by the WSJ and The New York Times as well as other publications, but according to another alum who graduated in 2015, Dan Gordon, during his time at Stonehill Gill was a school record holder on the men’s track team.
In a statement about Gill, Stonehill College praised his accomplishments at the school. “Keith was both an academic and athletic standout at the College and was inducted into the Stonehill College Athletic Hall of Fame based on his stellar cross-country career.”
Gill has been called by Stonehill “one of the most decorated runners in the rich history of the cross country and track & field programs.” He was the first Stonehill runner to earn All-American honors for cross country and indoor and outdoor track & field, still the only male runner to have accomplished this over a decade later.
Karen Boen, head coach of men’s and women’s cross country who coached Gill at the time he was a student, said in a statement today about Gill to Stonehill, “I have often said that Keith Gill made me a better coach. He was a very talented, driven athlete who trusted me to help him attain his athletic goals. Given his level of talent, this was a task I took very seriously.”
Boen praised Gill for pushing himself physically as well as mentally as an athlete, saying that his “mental tenacity,” was what enabled him to push himself harder physically than his competitors.
“Keith trusted the process and never considered himself to be more important than the team. He not only made me a better coach; he made his teammates a better team. Despite his numerous records and athletic accomplishments, team titles were always first and foremost,” Boen said.
According to Stonehill’s original statement, Gill graduated in good standing with a degree in Business Administration. Gill’s mother, in an interview with the WSJ, said his love for money and business has been present since he was a child.
Gill started a YouTube channel six months ago and runs it from the basement of his home in Wilmington, Massachusetts. He is the father of a two-year-old daughter and told The Journal that he is “just a normal guy.”
Mike Farwell, Stonehill Class of 2011, said that he was pleasantly shocked to see one of his peers in such large-scale news.
“Stonehill is such a small school,” Farwell said. “You don’t ever think that you’ll be so closely connected to a worldwide phenomenon.”
Farwell said that he was most impressed with the ability of Reddit users and other people on the internet to create such a change in the stock market so quickly.
He called it unifying, as many Reddit members intended to “squeeze” out short sellers, or buyers of stock who are selling back to the lender in hopes the stock will drop in price and they will gain a big profit.
“I think it’s very interesting to see a unification of society,” Farwell said. He said that this is evidence of the power of people online, especially millennials and Gen Z who make up most of the population of Reddit and most other social media platforms.
“It’s wild how powerful the internet is,” Farwell said.
According to National Public Radio, short selling has often been regarded as controversial because the market can be so unpredictable and hedge fund managers who make millions on this process have often been criticized for making inside trading deals in order to ensure a stock’s plummet.
What started as a way to help GameStop and other businesses such as Bed Bath & Beyond and AMC for Keith Gill has now turned into a question of legality within the stock market and third-party stock trading services on a national level.
Robinhood, a company known to itself and the public as a commission-free stock trading and investing app, restricted trading of GameStop stock and other stocks that have gained intense popularity this week, which led to an uproar on Reddit and the question of whether third-party investing services can restrict stock choices made on the free market.
According to CBS news, the decision “sparked fierce backlash from smaller investors and lawmakers, questioning the legality of the decisions.”
Shana Butler, who graduated from Stonehill in 2019 with an accounting major and now works as a private client tax associate, spoke out on her Instagram story yesterday against the company.
“Robinhood really went against their mission statement by protecting the rich hedge fund managers and hurting the everyday person using their app to invest,” she said. Butler said that she personally was not going to use the app anymore, as did many other Reddit users on Gill’s subreddit page.
“Frankly I can’t see how they will recover from this. Reputation and credibility play a huge part in investing and the market,” Butler said on Instagram.
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