GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen could have laid low after his disastrous CNBC interview earlier this week, where he failed to convince anyone that he actually had a sound plan to acquire eBay. Instead, the retail celebrity has followed that appearance up with a circus of missteps that only further cast doubt over how Cohen intends to raise $56 billion.
On Monday, Cohen kicked off a PR disaster by taking part in an interview where he refused to answer questions about his proposal to acquire eBay. The exchange between CNBC hosts trying their best to eke out anything from Cohen went viral because the CEO almost seemed annoyed he was being asked to explain anything at all.
By Wednesday, Cohen tried lightening the mood with a stunt. On X, he announced that he was now selling a variety of items via eBay. This, a GameStop PR rep said at the time, was how Cohen was going to afford to purchase eBay. Obviously, the idea Cohen could somehow finance an acquisition by selling junk like a pre-owned carpet square was a joke. One could even cynically interpret these actions as an active attempt to override Google results for the words “GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen” and “eBay.”
But what seemed like a play aimed at the memelords took a turn once people discovered that Cohen was trying to auction something controversial. As reported by Kotaku, a number of items Cohen listed appeared to hail from Game Informer’s famous Vault. When the print publication was initially shuttered by GameStop, its parent company, fans wondered what would happen to the Vault — which was significant enough to function as a museum. In an industry notorious for losing its own history, Game Informer’s decision to preserve memorabilia like sealed NES games was widely considered to be a laudable one.
Many feared that the Vault items were just going to rot in some warehouse or otherwise be forgotten by a company that no longer had use for them. The fate of the Vault, which has been reduced to a gag by a CEO with an estimated net worth of $5 billion, turned out to be much sadder than that.
A few hours after setting up shop, it briefly appeared like Cohen was going to get a small dose of karma. The CEO shared on X that he had been banned because he was “putting the eBay community at risk,” according to a vague notice sent by the platform. The notice said that Cohen was permanently barred from selling items on eBay, but his account appears to have since been reinstated. Now all the folks who think it’s a great idea to send thousands of dollars to someone who is already a billionaire are in the middle of making their dreams come true.
All of this transpired during a period when GameStop started selling $5,000 packs of Pokémon cards. Though these cards only guarantee a 0.4% chance of finding a rare card, there are real people out there who are buying GameStop’s most expensive Pokémon gacha. At least a couple of people claim to have already hit it big via Power Packs. But before you start pulling out your wallet, you should recognize that this means there’s an even smaller chance than before that the remaining Neutronium packs contain valuable cards.
I’d say it hasn’t been a great week for Cohen, but realistically, his willingness to put on a show keeps getting rewarded.
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