Robinhood/YouTube
- Robinhood will air a 30-second ad during this weekend’s Super Bowl.
- The app has made headlines for a short-squeeze saga involving GameStop and other stocks.
- The commercial is its first Super Bowl spot.
- Visit the Business section of Insider for more stories.
Robinhood will air a 30-second ad during this weekend’s Super Bowl in the wake of a tumultuous few weeks for the online brokerage.
The commercial – Robinhood’s first to run during a Super Bowl game – arrives at a crucial time for the company and will only further increase its awareness among mainstream audiences and undoubtedly lead to even more downloads of the stock-trading app.
In the ad, posted to Youtube on Wednesday, footage of people going about their daily lives plays as a voice-over says, “We are all investors.” The message echoes Robinhood’s stated mission to remove barriers to investing, with the voice telling viewers that they don’t need to become an investor, because they “were born one.”
Robinhood’s motto is “Democratizing finance for all,” and that accessibility is part of what attracted amateur traders, many of them from the WallStreetBets forum on Reddit, to buy up GameStop, AMC, and other stocks on the platform last week.
But Robinhood was met with outcry after it temporarily froze trading last week to meet clearing house regulations. Though the freeze has been lifted, the app still has trading restrictions and limits for several of the short-squeezed stocks.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Robinhood bought the ad time in December, and that a person familiar with the company's internal workings said there were discussions about whether to pull the spot in the wake of public outcry.
GameStop shares appear to be trending downwards - Tuesday saw them dip 85% below an all-time peak of $483, according to Markets Insider. Meanwhile, politicians from both parties are calling for hearings to investigate their trading practices.
Despite a surge of negative reviews and even a chartered plane trailing a banner expressing users' frustration with Robinhood, the app saw a rise in downloads last week. Insider reported Wednesday that its downloads increased nearly twofold last week versus the week before.
Judging by YouTubers' reactions to the new ad spot, the reaction has been mixed. As of 10:15 a.m. EST on Wednesday, the video posted Wednesday morning had 13 likes and 375 dislikes on YouTube.