GameStop Stock Has Become a Movement And It’s Getting Tougher to Bet Against It

According to Vickers Stock Research data, about 67.5% of GameStop's float is owned by retail investors. (Technically, Vickers describes 67.5% as being owned by "others," which excludes insiders, mutual funds, and institutional ownership – we can safely assume nearly all of this “others” category is retail shareholders).

Yahoo Finance attributes only 15% of GameStop's ownership to insiders, and the lion’s share of this is owned by one man: Ryan Cohen. Cohen, GameStop's Chairman, owns about 12% of GME.

Cohen does not own GameStop shares directly. Instead, he owns shares via a holding company, RC Ventures. Thus, some sources do not consider his ownership to be insider ownership but rather institutional ownership. This is why there are some significant differences in projected ownership structures across data sources.

Regardless, the upshot is that if you combine retail’s ~67% share with Cohen's ~12% share, it leaves only about 21% of GameStop's outstanding shares in the hands of institutions, mutual funds, and non-Cohen GME insiders. That means these players have significantly less leverage, while retail holders have outsized leverage.