Robinhood CEO Denies ‘Conspiracy Theory’ That Hedge Funds Pushed GameStop Trading Halt

Vlad Tenev and Celina Tenev attend the 2020 Breakthrough Prize Red Carpet at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, on Nov. 3, 2019. Ian Tuttle/Getty Images for Breakthrough Prize

Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev on Jan. 29 pushed back against the “conspiracy theory” that hedge funds prompted the mobile brokerage company’s decision to restrict users from purchasing shares in GameStop.

Members of Congress have in recent days called for an investigation into whether there was collusion by hedge funds and platforms like Robinhood, after purchases of hot stocks like GameStop, KOSS, and AMC were restricted by various platforms.