Bushkin.

Why is Miami, Miami?

What does the heartbreaking fate of the Cheetah tell us about the way we raise our children?

Why do Ivy League schools care so much about sports?

I'm Malcolm Gladwell. In my new audiobook, Revenge of the

Tipping Point, I'm returning to the subject of social epidemics and the dark side of contagious

phenomenon. Find revenge of the tipping point wherever you find audiobooks out now.

From you find audiobooks out now. From Pushkin Industries, this is Deep Background, the show where we explore the stories

behind the stories in the news. I'm Noah Feldman. This is still the beginning of our

new season here on Deep Background, and we've been talking about the Trump transition, the impeachment trial, and of course, the ongoing pandemic.

This week, though, another story emerged from Out of the Blue, a story sufficiently interesting and unexpected that we decided we shouldn't ignore it.

In particular, because this year we're focused on the theme of power.

By now, pretty much all of you must have heard about last week's run on GameStop stock,

a short squeeze that began around a Reddit group called Wall Street

Betts. Within 10 days, the GameStop stock gained more than 10 times its value, causing billions

in losses to hedge funds who had shorted the stock, raising the stock to a point where almost inevitably it will have to come down

very substantially. Because the markets teetered for a moment, this became a lead story around the

world. And it's a strange story, the odd issue on which it appears, both Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

and Donald Trump Jr. seem to be on the same side.

Here to speak to us today and make sense of this complex and fascinating topic is Alexis Goldstein,

a former Wall Street pro who now works as a senior policy analyst at Americans for Financial Reform.

She writes the popular newsletter, Markets Weekly.

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