The GameStop stock surge earlier this year made plenty of retail traders a lot of money, causing chaos across the stock market and drawing the attention of basically everyone online. That story is still playing out today, and those who still have the stock have followed along intently through those stock surges.
As it turns out, though, the Mormon Church has also found itself with diamond hands as it bought millions of dollars of tech stocks through its investment arm. As Business Insider outlined, the church’s $100 billion investment firm, Ensign Peak Advisors, bought big into some tech stocks in recent months according to SEC filings. And that includes millions of dollars in GameStop stock, which it bought for cheap and currently made a huge profit on.
The fund snapped up 46,000 GameStop shares for less than $19 each last quarter as well. That stake was worth $22 million at the height of the short squeeze in January, when GameStop’s stock price briefly hit $483. It’s still valued at about $7 million at the current share price, compared to less than $900,000 at the end of December.
Ensign, which is more than 50 years old, grew its total holdings from 1,740 to more than 1,850 during the period. The overall value of its US stock portfolio rose by 11% to $44 billion.
The SEC filing said that Ensign bought into companies like Tesla (quadrupling its holdings) and GameStop while cutting its positions on more traditional companies like Apple, Amazon, Alphabet and Microsoft. Interestingly, as Business Insider points out the church doesn’t invest in companies it finds “objectionable,” or that sell products that go against their religious beliefs. Tobacco, coffee companies and gambling aren’t in the portfolio, even companies like Coca-Cola aren’t in there. But apparently, video games and Funko Pops are good in their book. And making them lots of money.