You’ve seen the memes. Jim Cramer stands in front of a soundboard, hitting the "Buy, Buy, Buy" button with the frantic energy of a man who just drank five espressos, and three days later, the stock he praised falls off a cliff. For years, the internet has joked that the secret to infinite wealth is simply doing the exact opposite of whatever Cramer says. It’s a funny bit. Honestly, it’s one of the most persistent tropes in the world of retail investing.
But here is the thing: turning a meme into a functional investment vehicle is a lot harder than it looks on a Reddit thread.
The Jim Cramer inverse ETF, specifically the one known by the ticker SJIM (the Inverse Cramer Tracker ETF), was supposed to be the ultimate "I told you so" for the CNBC host's loudest critics. Launched by Matthew Tuttle of Tuttle Capital Management in early 2023, it was a bold experiment in social sentiment. It didn't just short Cramer; it tried to capture the very essence of the "Inverse Cramer" legend.
Then it closed. Fast.
The Rise and Very Quiet Fall of SJIM
If you're looking to buy shares of SJIM today, you’re out of luck. The fund officially stopped trading on February 13, 2024. It didn't even make it to its second birthday. Why? Because the market doesn't care about your memes.
The Jim Cramer inverse ETF ended its run with a loss of roughly 15% on a total return basis. At the same time, the S&P 500 was busy hitting record highs. It’s a bit of a reality check for the "Cramer is always wrong" crowd. When you actually put money behind the idea that a veteran market commentator is wrong 100% of the time, you realize that even a broken clock—or a bombastic TV personality—is right often enough to blow up a short position.
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Matthew Tuttle, the guy behind the fund, was pretty blunt about it. He noted that the "mission was accomplished" in terms of pointing out the lack of accountability in financial media, but the assets just weren't there. People love to tweet about the inverse Cramer strategy. They just don't love putting their actual retirement savings into it. By the time it shuttered, the fund only had about $2.4 million in assets. In the world of ETFs, that’s essentially a rounding error.
Why the Inverse Cramer Strategy Failed
Shorting a person is fundamentally different from shorting a sector or an index. Jim Cramer isn't a stagnant target. He talks about dozens of stocks a week.
The Magnificent Seven Problem
Cramer has been a massive cheerleader for the "Mag 7" (Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, etc.) for years. If you were holding SJIM, you were essentially shorting the greatest bull run in recent history. Being short Nvidia in 2023 and 2024 was a one-way ticket to a margin call. You can't be "inverse Cramer" without being "anti-tech" when tech is all he talks about.The Timing Trap
The fund’s prospectus was a chaotic read. The adviser had to monitor Cramer’s Twitter (now X) and his appearances on "Mad Money" in real-time. If Jim liked a stock, the fund shorted it. If he changed his mind two days later, the fund had to flip the position. The transaction costs and the "bid-ask" spreads on that kind of high-turnover trading are absolute killers.The "Broken Clock" Effect
People remember the Silicon Valley Bank recommendation—where Cramer said the stock was fine shortly before the bank collapsed. Those are the legendary misses. But they forget the hundreds of times he recommends a boring blue-chip stock that goes up 4% and stays there. An inverse ETF loses money on those boring wins just as fast as it makes money on the spectacular failures.🔗 Read more: Canada Tariffs on US Goods Before Trump: What Most People Get Wrong
Is the "Cramer Effect" Real?
There is some academic weight to the idea that Cramer affects the market, but it’s usually a short-term "pop." Researchers have studied this for a decade. Usually, when Jim mentions a stock, it gets a small bump in after-hours trading or the next morning because of the "Mad Money" viewers rushing in.
Then, usually within a few days, that "pop" fades.
The Jim Cramer inverse ETF tried to capitalize on that fade, but the fee structure of the ETF (around 1.2%) was so high that it ate a lot of the potential alpha. You’re paying a premium to bet against a guy who, for all his faults, has been watching tape since the 80s.
What Most People Get Wrong About Betting Against TV Stars
The biggest misconception is that Cramer is a "trading" signal. He’s not. He’s entertainment that happens to involve the stock market.
When you look at the Long Cramer Tracker ETF (LJIM)—which was the "pro-Cramer" version of the fund—it also failed and closed even earlier than the inverse one. It turns out that neither following him nor betting against him was a winning strategy in a vacuum. The market is too complex to be distilled into the opinions of one guy in a suburban New Jersey studio.
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Most critics of the Jim Cramer inverse ETF point out that the fund was doomed by its own design. It was a "long/short" strategy that never really had the chance to "rip." It was too diversified across too many of Cramer's picks. To really make money on an inverse Cramer play, you’d have to pick his one or two most "unhinged" calls and go heavy. A broad ETF can't do that; it has to be systematic.
What Now? Practical Steps for the Retail Investor
So, the ETF is dead. Does that mean the inverse Cramer strategy is dead?
Not necessarily on an individual level. If you still feel like Jim is the ultimate counter-indicator, you don't need a specialized ETF to prove it. But you should probably be smarter than the fund was.
- Look for the Hype Peak: Instead of shorting every "Buy" recommendation, look for when he gets "exhausted" on a theme. When he's screaming about a niche sector that has already tripled, that's the "Cramer top" people talk about.
- Check the Institutional Flow: If Jim is bullish but the big "smart money" institutions are selling, that’s a better signal than just Jim being loud.
- Mind the Fees: If you’re trying to mirror an inverse strategy yourself, watch out for the borrow fees on shorting. They can be just as expensive as the 1.2% fee SJIM charged.
The story of the Jim Cramer inverse ETF is a cautionary tale about "thematic" investing. Just because something is a great meme doesn't mean it’s a great business model. In the end, Jim Cramer is still on TV every night, and the fund that tried to bet against him is a footnote in a SEC filing.
If you want to actually beat the market, you're better off ignoring the TV altogether. Focus on free cash flow, debt-to-equity ratios, and actual earnings. It’s a lot less "fun" than hitting a "Sell" button every time Jim yells, but your bank account will probably look a lot healthier in 2026.
Keep an eye on the "Magnificent Seven" and their performance relative to Cramer’s 2026 "Year of Magical Investing" warnings. If he’s finally right about the AI pullback, the people who missed the inverse ETF might finally get their "I told you so" moment—just without the ticker symbol to go with it.