By Reuters | Updated: May 6, 2026
May 5 (Reuters) – GameStop’s (GME.N) $56 billion bid for eBay (EBAY.O) ignited intense debate on social media, as retail investors greeted the potential deal with a mix of excitement, skepticism and meme-stock humor.
- Top comments on Reddit were split between enthusiasm over the e-commerce giant that such a merger would create, and skepticism about how GameStop would finance such a large deal.
- Some users supported the rationale of combining GameStop’s loyal retail base with eBay’s online reach, arguing the deal could create a formidable digital commerce player.
- The video game retailer, which has a market value of $10.7 billion and is looking to take over a much larger company, has said it has access to $20 billion in potential debt financing from TD Securities.
- GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen’s tense CNBC interview on Monday, where he bristled at questions about the deal structure, also became meme fodder.
- Users raised their eyebrows at the announcement of Michael Burry’s exit from his GameStop position on Monday, just months after he likened Cohen to the legendary investor Warren Buffett.
- On Stocktwits.com, eBay was one of the most talked-about stocks, with the platform’s tracker showing message sentiment over the past 24 hours as “extremely bullish.”
- Retail investor forums can offer an early read on how speculative corners of the market are digesting major corporate developments.
Reporting by Niket Nishant in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli
© Thomson Reuters 2026
