OPEN: Opendoor Stock Goes Vertical as Meme Trading Roars Back — Here’s What Happened

San Francisco-based real estate dealer soared more than 120% on Monday before coming down to close up by 43%. “We are so back,” meme stock traders, probably.

📈 Opendoor Goes Up and Down

• Opendoor Technologies OPEN surged as much as 120% on Monday, triggering volatility halts before settling up 43% for the day — a chaotic rally that had meme stock traders screaming, “We are so back.”
• The San Francisco-based real estate tech firm — the one swimming in the sluggish US housing market — has tripled in value over the past week, catapulting into GameStop-AMC territory as the latest meme stock darling.
• Retail traders, options junkies, and short sellers got thrown into the same blender, and what came out was one of the wildest sessions the market has seen in months.

🧨 Gamma Squeeze 101

• This wasn’t just a garden-variety short squeeze. About 24% of Opendoor shares were sold short, per S3 Partners — a clear powder keg. But the real accelerant? A gamma squeeze playing out in the options market.
• Here’s the quick-and-dirty: Retail investors piled into call options (bullish bets on the stock). As demand surged, the sellers of those options had to buy shares to hedge their risk, forcing the stock even higher — the snake eating its own tail.
• But gamma cuts both ways. As Opendoor shares cooled off, the same hedging dynamics began unwinding, triggering a punishing reversal from intraday highs. The stock didn’t crash — but the air definitely got thinner.

🏡 What Is Opendoor Again?

• Opendoor is a tech firm that uses algorithms to buy and sell homes. Think: Zillow, but with a faster refresh rate and slightly less existential dread. It operates in a market that’s been locked in stasis thanks to high interest rates and frozen inventory.
• But none of that mattered Monday. Opendoor became one of the most traded stocks on Wall Street, eclipsing even some tech juggernauts in shares exchanged. Fundamentals? Not today.
• Even with this big swing, the shares are down 90% from their 2021 peak when the company was valued at more than $20 billion.