Trading action in the wider market was mixed Thursday, with equities trading right around the break-even line in the noon hour. Meme stocks, however, were taking it on the chin.

Meta Materials Inc. (NASDAQ: MMAT) was giving back about half its 20% Wednesday share price increase. There was no news to account for the falling share price, other than the usual volatility in the stock since late June, when it took on a new name and business. Just following this stock makes us dizzy.

DiDi Global Inc. (NYSE: DIDI) is China’s Uber, and its ill-fated June 30 initial public offering has been plagued by the Chinese government’s determination to rein in foreign IPOs. In what has turned out to be a huge mistake in judgment, DiDi ignored its home government’s warning not to proceed with a U.S. IPO. The government has cracked down hard on DiDi, and there were reports Thursday morning that huge fines and perhaps even a de-listing may be imposed on the company.

Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc. (NYSE: SPCE) stock also was having a bad day. As with most of the meme stocks, there was no reason other than that the shares added about 2% on Wednesday, so the stock needed to trade lower Thursday. Space tourism is a crowded field, now that Blue Origin has completed its first flight. How large is the crowd waiting to pay a rumored $250,000 for the privilege of taking a 15-minute trip to the edge of space? Enough to support two companies?

 

AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc. (NYSE: AMC) on Wednesday added the chairperson’s title to CEO Adam Aron’s job description. That sent the stock price down about 8.5% — or not. Maybe it slipped just because it rose by nearly $9 on Tuesday.

AMC traded down more than 5.5% on Thursday, at $38.47 in a 52-week range of $1.91 to $72.62. The average daily trading volume is more than 171 million shares, and nearly 70 million had changed hands by midday Thursday.

Virgin Galactic stock traded down about 6.6% to $31.17, in a 52-week range of $14.27 to $62.80. The average daily trading volume tops 40 million shares. More than 16 million had changed hands.

DiDi Global was down nearly 10%, at $10.35 in a post-IPO range of $10.30 to $18.01. The low was posted earlier in the morning. The average daily trading volume in the stock was around 96 million, and about 44 million had traded thus far on Thursday.

Shares of Meta Materials were sinking by nearly 9%, trading at around $3.49 in a 52-week range of $0.42 to $21.76. More than 15 million shares had traded, compared with a daily average of about 20.8 million.

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