No, there's no theft going on here. It's simple panic. People are selling their shares at a low price due to fear. Each individual investor is empowered to make his own decisions. So there are no victims. There are only willing participants in a mutually voluntary transaction (i.e for each seller there's a buyer). Today I'm one of the buyers. Someone just sold me 3,000 shares at approximately $1.85. I was happy to buy those shares from him at that price, and he was evidently happy to sell those shares to me at that price.