AMC shares climbed nearly 21% in overnight trading to $3.07, per TradingView. The trigger: CEO Adam Aron publicly attacked Robinhood for issuing tokenized versions of the company’s stock without its consent.
In a social media post on Sept. 4, 2026, Aron called the practice “contemptible, outrageous, disgusting, detestable, inexcusable, vile” and said AMC “ha[s] no connection to this at all, and do[es] not condone it in any way.” The tokenized versions of U.S. stocks, he said, are not registered under federal securities laws. AMC will immediately have its outside securities counsel review the matter.
Robinhood CEO and Chairman Vlad Tenev replied with two words: “What’s the concern?” The Block said it reached out to Robinhood (HOOD) for further comment.
The clash revives scrutiny of how issuers’ equity is being represented onchain without their sign-off. According to The Block, Robinhood’s own documentation says its stock tokens are tokenized debt securities issued by an offshore affiliate, Robinhood Assets. Holders get exposure to the underlying stock but no legal ownership of the company and no shareholder rights. Robinhood stipulates the tokens have not been registered as securities in the U.S. and may not be offered in the country.
AMC is not the first issuer to object. OpenAI publicly rejected Robinhood’s token offerings last year. The company said the tokens were not OpenAI equity, that it had not partnered with or endorsed the offering, and that it had not approved any transfer of its shares. Tenev said at the time the tokens were “not technically equity” but derivatives giving retail investors exposure to the private company. He argued tokenization should not require an opt-in from the firms being tokenized.
The position that a platform can tokenize a company’s stock without the company’s blessing is now meeting more resistance. The tokenized-stocks market has grown fast: total market cap reached $13.4 billion as of Sept. 1, up from $2.5 billion at the start of 2026, according to The Block’s data dashboard.
Traders, as ever, disagree. The overnight move in AMC shares coincided with Aron’s statements, though a direct causal link has not been confirmed.
Whether AMC’s promised legal review turns into an actual filing is not yet known.
