Ryan Cohen

Early life and entrepreneurial beginnings

Ryan Cohen was born in 1986 into a Jewish family in Montreal, Quebec. His mother was a teacher and his father, Ted Cohen, ran a glassware importing business. Cohen has cited his father as his primary inspiration and mentor in pursuing an entrepreneurial path, crediting him with instilling a strong work ethic and the principle of delayed gratification. He never attended college, choosing instead to focus on business ventures from a young age. At the age of 15, he started his first enterprise, collecting referral fees from various e-commerce websites. This early experience laid the groundwork for his future ventures in online retail and his hands-on approach to business operations. His father's death in December 2019 was a significant personal event that Cohen later referenced as a motivator for sharing his father's lessons.

Building and selling Chewy

In 2011, at age 25, Cohen founded the online pet supply company MrChewy, later renamed Chewy. The inspiration came from his own experience shopping for his poodle, Tylee. To grow the business, Cohen adopted Amazon's logistical and supply chain models but differentiated Chewy with an intense focus on customer service, which included sending handwritten holiday cards, pet portraits, and flowers to customers who had lost a pet. Initial fundraising was difficult, with Cohen reporting rejections from over 100 venture capital firms. He secured the company's first major outside investment of $15 million from Volition Capital in 2013. Subsequent funding rounds attracted major investors like BlackRock and T. Rowe Price New Horizons Fund. By 2016, Chewy had become the largest online pet retailer in the United States with $900 million in sales. The company's value was credited in part to its customer relationships and its commitment of nearly one sixth of its employees to 24-hour customer service. In April 2017, PetSmart purchased Chewy for $3.35 billion, which was at the time the largest e-commerce acquisition on record. Cohen remained as CEO, growing revenue to $3.5 billion in 2018, with 66 percent of sales coming from automatic recurring shipments, before stepping down. Chewy later went public in June 2019 at a valuation of $8.7 billion, more than double its 2017 sale price, and reached $11.86 billion in net sales by fiscal 2024.

Activist investing and entry into GameStop

Following the sale of Chewy, Cohen became an activist investor. He made a significant investment in Apple, making him the largest individual shareholder of the tech company with 1.55 million shares, which became 6.2 million split-adjusted shares by August 2020. In September 2020, he disclosed a near 10 percent stake in the struggling video game retailer GameStop through his firm RC Ventures, making him the company's biggest individual investor. He increased this stake to 12.9 percent by December 17, 2020, and filed documents expressing a willingness to get more involved to produce the best results for shareholders. This move occurred as GameStop faced serious questions about its long-term viability due to declining revenue and the video game industry's shift toward digital downloads. Cohen's investment and public letters to the board signalled a new direction for the company, one that would eventually lead to his direct leadership.

The GameStop turnaround strategy and results

Cohen joined the GameStop board in January 2021 along with two former Chewy executives. He was appointed chairman of the board on June 9, 2021, to lead a new committee in charge of a company-wide transformation. On September 28, 2023, Cohen took over as CEO. His strategy focused on drastic cost reduction and a shift in business mix. During his tenure, the company's selling, general and administrative expenses were cut from approximately $1.7 billion in fiscal 2021 to $910.2 million in fiscal 2025, a reduction of 47 percent. The company moved from an operating loss in fiscal 2024 to net income of $418.4 million in fiscal 2025. This profitability was aided by growth in collectibles and graded trading cards, which overtook hardware and software as its largest revenue segment. In the first quarter of fiscal 2026, GameStop reported operating income of $143.3 million and net sales of $835.3 million, up 14 percent from the prior-year quarter. The company said this result represented the highest first-quarter operating income in its history. That same quarter, it reported net income of $389.6 million, which it called its highest quarterly profit to date. The company's market capitalization rose from about $1.3 billion when Cohen joined the board to roughly $9.3 billion by early 2026, though the stock remained below its 2021 meme-stock peak.

The eBay acquisition bid and executive compensation

In May 2026, Cohen led GameStop in making an unsolicited bid to acquire eBay for $125 per share in a cash-and-stock deal valuing the company at approximately $55.5 billion, split evenly between cash and GameStop common stock. Cohen argued that cost reductions could materially increase eBay’s earnings per share, and that GameStop’s roughly 1,600 U.S. locations could provide eBay a national network for authentication, fulfillment, and live commerce. He set a target of $2 billion in annual cost reductions at eBay within 12 months, pointing to his record at GameStop and his earlier scaling of Chewy as evidence of his ability to execute. The financing drew skepticism from analysts, as eBay’s market cap of over $48 billion far exceeded GameStop’s roughly $10 billion. Cohen’s CNBC interview discussing the bid was described as awkward and at times combative, and drew widespread attention online. On May 12, eBay’s board rejected the proposal, calling it neither credible nor attractive. Regarding compensation, Cohen receives no salary, cash bonus, or time-vesting stock from GameStop. In January 2026, the board granted him a 100 percent performance-based stock option award valued by press reports at approximately $35 billion if fully earned, covering 171.5 million shares at $20.66 per share. The award was divided into nine tranches that vested only if GameStop simultaneously hit market-capitalization and cumulative-EBITDA targets, with full vesting requiring a $100 billion market capitalization and $10 billion in cumulative EBITDA. In June 2026, at Cohen's request, the board approved cancelling this award to ensure management focus remained on GameStop's operating performance and the proposed eBay bid.

Other investments and legal matters

Cohen's investment strategy through RC Ventures has included significant activist and passive positions. In March 2022, it was disclosed he had a near 10 percent stake in Bed Bath & Beyond. Between August 15 and 18, 2022, his firm sold all of the stock, totaling 9.45 million shares, for an estimated $68 million profit. In August 2022, he was named in a federal lawsuit alleging a fraudulent scheme to artificially inflate the price of Bed Bath & Beyond's stock in a pump and dump. The case was dismissed in June 2024. He has acquired a large stake in Alibaba worth hundreds of millions of dollars and, in August 2023, began communicating with the company's board, encouraging them to increase their share-repurchase program. They later extended it to March 2025 and raised the amount from $25 billion to $40 billion. He continued to bolster his GameStop position with purchases, including 100,000 more shares on March 22, 2022, and a purchase of 443,842 shares on June 9, 2023, equivalent to a $10 million investment. His portfolio also includes large passive investments in Wells Fargo and Netflix.

Public persona, publications, and personal life

Cohen has cultivated a public persona as a critic of corporate norms and has been dubbed the 'Meme King' for his influence on meme stocks like GameStop. He has publicly expressed criticism of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies. In early 2025, he criticized Canada and France for 'wokeness and DEI' and said they have 'high taxes, Liberalism, Socialism, Progressivism' that generated a challenging business environment. He supported Donald Trump during the 2024 United States presidential election and has promoted the conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was rigged. In 2022, he published a series of children's books titled Teddy, based on lessons he learned from his father. He wrote that by writing these books, he was sharing his father's values and passing his wisdom on to his children. Cohen lives in a $24 million waterfront mansion in Bal Harbour, Florida. As of May 2026, Forbes estimated his net worth at $5.1 billion, while Maclean's estimated his net worth at $5.6 billion in 2024.

Questions about Ryan Cohen

How did Ryan Cohen make his money?

Ryan Cohen made his initial fortune by founding the online pet retailer Chewy in 2011 and selling it to PetSmart in 2017 for $3.35 billion, the largest e-commerce acquisition at that time. His wealth further increased through savvy activist investments in companies like Apple, where he became the largest individual shareholder, and GameStop. Profits from trades like the sale of his Bed Bath & Beyond stake, estimated at $68 million, also contributed. As CEO of GameStop, he oversaw a dramatic financial turnaround that significantly increased the company's market value and his personal stake in it.

What is Ryan Cohen's role at GameStop?

Ryan Cohen is the chairman of the board and chief executive officer of GameStop. He joined the board as an activist investor in January 2021, became chairman in June 2021, and assumed the CEO role in September 2023. His leadership has focused on deep cost-cutting, reducing selling, general and administrative expenses by 47 percent, and pivoting the company's business toward collectibles and graded trading cards. This strategy returned GameStop to profitability by fiscal 2025. He receives no salary, cash bonus, or time-vesting stock from the company.

Where is Ryan Cohen from in Canada?

Ryan Cohen is from Montreal, Quebec. He was born there in 1986 to a Jewish family. His mother was a teacher and his father, Ted Cohen, was a glassware importer who served as a major inspiration for his entrepreneurial career. Cohen never attended college and began his first business at age 15. He has since relocated to the United States, residing in a $24 million waterfront mansion in Bal Harbour, Florida.

What is Ryan Cohen's net worth?

As of May 2026, Forbes estimated Ryan Cohen's net worth to be $5.1 billion. This wealth stems from the sale of Chewy, his substantial shareholdings in GameStop and other companies like Apple and Alibaba, and the increased valuation of GameStop under his management. Other estimates, such as one from Maclean's in 2024, placed his net worth at $5.6 billion. His compensation at GameStop is entirely performance-based, with no traditional salary.

Why is Ryan Cohen called the 'Meme King'?

Ryan Cohen earned the nickname 'Meme King' for his central role in the 2021 meme-stock phenomenon, particularly surrounding GameStop. His activist investment and letters to the GameStop board galvanized a large community of retail investors on social media platforms like Reddit. This collective action led to a historic short squeeze that caused GameStop's stock price to skyrocket, inflicting major losses on hedge funds and upending traditional Wall Street expectations. His continued influence on the stock through his leadership maintains this association.

Sources: Wikipedia and current public reporting, checked by the Yadude Books desk. Last updated 2026-10-21.