Five years after the GameStop frenzy, retail investors are reshaping the market.

Five years after a group of online traders were sent to game stop The influence of retail investors has soared, upending Wall Street’s assumptions about “shit money,” but that influence has proven more durable and long-lasting than many expected.

What began as a dramatic short squeeze in early 2021 has developed into a sustained force in the stock market, reshaping trading dynamics, prompting hedge funds to adapt, providing a steady source of cash flow for rush buyers, and supporting one of the longest bull markets in history.

“Retail investors were the signal,” said Tom Lee, head of research at FundStrat, whose flagship exchange-traded fund has more than $4 billion in assets. “When they were buying on the edge, I knew bull markets were healthy. The post-2020 world looks a lot like the ’90s to me. That is, retail investors are really good at fleshing out good growth stories, and then they can execute on them with scale and conviction. They are differentiators.”

Before the pandemic, retail trades accounted for only a small portion of daily U.S. stock trading volume, but that has changed as millions of new investors enter the market thanks to lockdown-era government stimulus payments, zero-commission trading and social media-powered collaboration.

“People thought that once the coronavirus was over and everyone went back to some form of normal life, participation in this retail industry would go away and come back,” said Steve Quirk, chief brokerage officer at Robinhood Markets. “What’s a little surprising is that it’s continued so strongly.”

Retail investor participation in U.S. stocks has averaged nearly 20% of daily trading volume, up from low single digits before COVID-19, said Jeff Shen, co-chief investment officer and co-head of Systematic Active Equities at BlackRock.

“Certainly there is a social aspect that is quite different from a classic hedge fund, which is highly independent,” Shen said. Among different types of Main Street investors, “the social aspect makes these kinds of flows very interrelated.”

Quirk noted that on high-volume days, retail participation in equities can jump to nearly 40% of volume, and on the options side it can reach 50% of volume.

During the meme stock frenzy, traders flocked to online forums like Reddit’s WallStreetBets, where ideas spread at a rapid pace and unprecedented scale. Figures like Keith Gill, known online as “Roaring Kitty,” have emerged as the core of loosely connected communities that share research, trading strategies, and deep skepticism about Wall Street orthodoxy. The GameStop saga has also left a mark on pop culture, serving as the inspiration for the 2023 film Dumb Money starring Paul Dano and Seth Rogen.

Far from being wiped out, retail investors continue to pour in money after the meme stock boom fades, with retail flows reaching a new record in 2025, according to JPMorgan. The bank said inflows jumped nearly 60% year-over-year and were about 17% higher than the previous peak recorded in 2021, when meme stock trading was at its height.

“This is a new retail investor who is more informed, more engaged and has more tools,” said Devin Ryan, senior analyst at Citizens JMP. “It’s not just about democratizing access to markets, it’s about democratizing information.”

Lower trading fees and the rise of fractional trading in 2019 also helped open up the market ahead of the coronavirus. A few decades ago, transaction fees were close to $100. By 2020, most brokerages also added the ability to trade “fractional” shares. This means that instead of needing thousands of dollars to access your favorite tech stocks, you can buy them in dollar amounts. And there was almost no account minimum.

Respect from educational institutions

Hedge funds and short sellers learned a painful lesson. In an era when individual traders can quickly mobilize capital and magnify their moves, concentrated bearish positions carry greater risk.

“It’s really great to lose the stupid money moniker and gain respect from financial institutions,” said J.J. Kinahan, head of retail expansion and alternative investment products at Cboe Global Markets. “Experts have learned lessons from the tenacity of individual investors who believe in companies and keep buying.”

To avoid becoming the target of coordinated buying, many hedge funds are reducing short exposure, diversifying their portfolios and investing heavily in tracking retail sentiment.

“For many professional investors, individual traders have become annoying TV series-like villains who are never fully explained,” said Ivan Chosovich, founder of Breakout Point, a company that tracks the activities of individual traders on bulletin boards. “Now, five years later, the show is basically in season five, and somehow they’re still in the cast.”

The push buying by retail investors comes on top of major downturns, such as the steep sell-off in early April due to tariffs. SPDR Gold Share (GLD) — Last year brought in big gains that caught Wall Street’s attention.

In 2026, following the U.S. attack on Venezuela, everyday investors are focusing on energy stocks and silver amid the metal’s monster run. Silver topped the $100 per ounce mark for the first time last week.

“They’re really, really savvy,” said Quirk of Robinhood Markets. “They bailed out the market during COVID, they bailed out the market during the tariff period. They were aggressive buyers.”

Certainly, GameStop AMC. While demand for options and leveraged funds has skyrocketed in recent years, new types of meme stocks have also emerged, including: open door and kohls It sprouted in 2025.

But Douglas Yones, CEO of exchange-traded fund manager Direxion, said individual investors are smart about using high-risk leveraged products. Corporate research shows that individual investors typically put only a small portion of their overall portfolio into these speculative investments, keeping most of their money in more traditional investments.

“The market is in the hands of the retailers,” said Yones, a former New York Stock Exchange executive. “Volatility was incredibly good for end investors.”

transfer of wealth

Retail is becoming more influential in a favorable environment of rising stock prices and intergenerational wealth transfers from baby boomers, a shift that is gradually concentrating capital into the hands of investors accustomed to digital-first transactions.

Fundstrat’s Lee said household investors collectively manage more assets than institutional investors, and about 76% of household assets are held by people over 60, a group that has traditionally been less active in trading but is gaining influence as assets are transferred.

Lee added that approximately $120 trillion will be inherited by Millennials and Gen Z over the next 20 years.

“Retailer participation could be even greater,” Lee said. “That’s four times the size of the U.S. economy. That’s more wealth than the entire net worth of China.”

Securities firms are starting to build tools to cater to these young investors. They are overwhelmingly moving towards 24/7 trading, a hallmark of crypto markets that trade at night and on weekends. With prediction markets booming, more companies are offering access to cryptocurrencies and crypto ETFs. Private market products aimed at average investors are also on the rise.

“The greatest thing since sliced ​​bread”

Already data shows how much youth skin there is in the game. JPMorgan found that in 2024, 37% of 25-year-olds had moved “significant” amounts of money from checking accounts to investment accounts in recent years, a significant increase from 6% who recorded similar behavior in 2015.

Nick Wyatt, a 27-year-old auditor, is another trader in the coronavirus era. With more downtime due to the pandemic, the Michigan resident researched and consulted friends about the best way to increase the extra money he had saved from his part-time market job. When Wyatt first started investing, he briefly tried day-trading stocks, but soon decided to adopt a conservative, long-term strategy, such as funding a Roth personal retirement account.

“This is the best decision I’ve ever made,” Wyatt said. Wyatt has since encouraged his fiancée to invest and used the profits to pay for a house. “Compound interest is the greatest thing since sliced ​​bread. There’s nothing like it.”

Correction: This article has been updated to correct quotes from Robinhood Markets’ Steve Quirk and Fundstrat’s Tom Lee.