Robinhood Is Down To 1 Star On Google’s Mobile App Store Again, This Time Google Won’t Intervene - Forbes

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Topline

Online stock trading platform Robinhood has seen its review score on Google’s mobile app store plummet to a one-star rating out of five for the second time in less than a week, as irate users flooded the app with negative reviews in retaliation to its decision to curb the trading of several popular but volatile meme stocks like GameStop and AMC last week, highlighting how anger over the incident still persists among online traders.

Key Facts

At the time of publishing, Robinhood has a 1.1-star rating out of five from over 310,000 reviews on Google Play Store, after slipping down to a similar number last week.

The score had shot back up to 4.3 stars after Google threw out more than 100,000 reviews in an action against what it called “coordinated or inorganic reviews,” without offering any further details.

Google is unlikely to intervene this time though as it told The Verge that the new reviews are compliant with Google’s policies, and won’t be removed.

The trading app is doing much better review-wise on the Apple iPhone’s App Store where it holds a 4-star rating although the number of negative reviews on the platform is growing.

Key Background

Last week, Google cracked down on ‘review bombing’ of the Robinhood app, deleting around 125,000 negative reviews which it deemed “coordinated or inorganic reviews.” The company did not respond to requests for comment from Forbes on how it deemed a review as inorganic. The review bombing was part of a larger backlash against Robinhood and Wall Street after many stock trading apps either suspended or severely restricted the trade of Gamestop, AMC and several other so-called meme stocks that saw an unprecedented social media-backed rally. Since then, Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev has defended the decision in an interview with Elon Musk on the social media app Clubhouse. Tenev said that the company was forced to act after being asked by the National Securities Clearing Corporation (NSCC) to put up $3 billion in collateral to continue trading in the volatile stocks. This demand was later slashed to $700 million, allowing Robinhood to reopen limited trading of the stocks.

Tangent

Google’s venture capital arm GV invested an undisclosed amount in Robinhood in an early seed funding round in 2013 that saw the stock trading platform raise $3 million.