Just like industry peer Beasley Media Group experienced on Wednesday, those who participate in Discord chat rooms about investment opportunities — as seen on social media platform X — are actively seeking to drive iHeartMedia shares skyward.
During the noon hour, their posts appeared to be working, with “IHRT” shares up by more than 12% in brisk trading on Nasdaq.
As the Closing Bell neared, a healthy gain on the day was still in play.
With volume reaching nearly 2.6 million shares at 12:42pm Eastern, on average volume of 1.47 million shares, iHeartMedia stock was trading at $5.32 — up 61 cents — from yesterday.
That’s a 12.8% gain and came two hours after “IHRT” rocketed to $5.43 per share. That’s a price not seen since the end of February 2023 for the largest audio content creation and distribution firm in the U.S.
As of 3:30pm, “IHRT” was up 7.2% to $5.05 as momentum cooled but remained noteworthy, based on the Discord and X activity alone.
Fueling the growth at the company led by CEO Bob Pittman and COO/CFO Rich Bressler, who is handing his Chief Financial Officer duties to Mike McGuinness at the start of 2026?
Look no further than X posts such as these:
Another post highlighted a September 30 announcement noting iHeartMedia had partnered with Medical Care Technologies “in a marketing effort to leverage the platforms 270 million monthly users.” The post misspelled the word “Care.” The same poster, Roberto Velazquez, also played up how Netflix and iHeartMedia were talking about podcast licensing. That was a November 4 report.
With 145 followers, Velazquez says he’s an individual with “5 Years of Wrestling the Markets with Technical Trading. Failures, Frustrations, Filtered and Simplified now into what Works.”
Interestingly, iHeartMedia shares were highlighted by blogger Kayode Omotosho with StockStory as one of three small-cap stocks “we approach with caution” in a Wednesday post.
With a market cap at $663.5 million on December 10, Omotosho steers clear of iHeartMedia for three reasons:
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Muted 4.9% annual revenue growth over the last five years shows its demand lagged behind its consumer discretionary peers
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Shrinking returns on capital from an already weak position reveal that neither previous nor ongoing investments are yielding the desired results
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Unfavorable liquidity position could lead to additional equity financing that dilutes shareholders
Don’t tell that to the gamers who are potentially gaming investors in “IHRT,” including lead institutional investors Allianz Asset Management GmbH (with 39.49% interest in iHeartMedia) and Ashley Tabor-King helmed Global Media & Entertainment Investments Ltd. (with 31.89% interest in the company.
Other key institutional investors include Blackrock, The Vanguard Group, and Charles Schwab Investment Management, based on September 30 data.
All stand to gain, at least today. What happens on Friday could burst the latest “meme stock” bubble — unless something else is afoot among traders.
