Correct me if I'm wrong, but that was at the end of the trading day, when people already made it clear their original BS blog post wasn't convincing anyone. IMO Robinhood is clearly in the wrong. It may not be as malignant as the Citadel collusion theory, but they did in fact treat their own customers like idiots. And it backfired.
Not going to defend RH, but I have some insight with regards to corporate communications.
A company in panic fire extuingisher mode has to put out some type of announcement. RH did. Twice in one day. I can believe the first one was a canned response, and the second one looks like a more thoughtful letter.
But have you ever thought how much internal wrangling, or how many draft revisions even such a short piece has to go through? The company has to be very careful in what they say in their comms - plus even more cautious with their phrasing and wording used. These types of comms will be read by arms chair lawyers and real lawyers alike. The latter will look for opportunities.
The former will read it like they were the devil's advocate themselves.
Corporate comms teams have to put in a lot of effort, and go through numerous rapid iterations, to make sure their published material is factually accurate and anodyne. In a crisis situation, even more than usual.
