I am sure they broke laws. There are so many laws they had to break some. But in principle, they didn’t do anything really wrong or anything that isn’t common practice by wall street insiders.
An argument can be made for securities manipulation type charges, that they organized an effort to manipulate the share price of GameStop. But they did so openly and freely and publicly, some even openly admitted that their motive was to teach these giant short selling funds a lesson... and these giant funds do the exact same thing, they just do it from ivory towers with political connections and in hushed tones most of the time (or, they hire firms to publish negative research reports with dubious credibility to influence the public into selling or avoiding specific stocks).
In the end, like we have seen over and over again the last many years, I would bet money that the SEC will send the FBI to drag a few people out of bed in their pajamas over this. But the optics of doing so may not turn out so well - unless the social platforms and media decide to stifle discussion over it.
Thanks for your detailed explanation. I think us average folks are becoming increasingly frustrated and angry. The elites are stoking a very, very dangerous fire.