New York Mets owner Steve Cohen is taking a “break” from Twitter after saying his family received personal threats this week amid an ongoing stock trading clash between day traders and hedge funds.
“I really enjoyed coming and going with Mets fans on Twitter, which unfortunately was overwhelmed this week by the misinformation that had nothing to do with the Mets that caused our family to receive personal threats,” Cohen said Saturday after deactivating your account on Friday night. “So I’ll take a break for now. We have other ways to listen to your suggestions and stay committed to doing so. I love our team, this community and our fans, who are the best in baseball. It’s that this week’s events do not affect our resources in any way and drive the position of a championship team on the field. “
Cohen’s decision to leave Twitter appears to stem from the conflict between independent investors and hedge funds. Day traders, mobilized on Reddit, have invested almost all the money they can find in the shares of video game retailer GameStop and some other defeated companies. Its purchase has raised corporate stock prices beyond anyone’s imagination and caused huge losses in hedge funds that had bet on stocks to fall.
Cohen’s Point72 Asset Management became involved when it invested in Melvin Capital Management, a hedge fund that had bet heavily on GameStop and angered Reddit users.
GameStop shot up about 70% on Friday to close at $ 325. Over the last three weeks, the shares have made an impressive 1,600% gain. The danger to day traders is that, at any moment, stocks may collapse.
Before closing his Twitter account, Cohen, the richest owner in baseball, worth more than $ 14.5 billion, responded to the controversy on Tuesday by tweeting: “Crude crowd tonight on Twitter.
Among critics of Cohen, WFAN morning host and former NFL quarterback Boomer Esiason, he said he would stop going to the Mets games “until he finds out exactly what’s going on here” regarding the involvement of Cohen with the GameStop situation.
The Mets owner had previously garnered nearly 200,000 Twitter followers for his irreverent interactions with fans, where he took suggestions on how to lead the team, reacting to the team’s most important moves, such as trading from the Francisco Lindor playing field, and mocked a return of black shirts.
Joon Lee and ESPN’s The Associated Press contributed to this report.