I just read that in the WSJ. WOW.

New Primary song:

We’re in the money
We’re in the money
We’ve got a lot of what it takes to get along
We’re in the money
And skies are sunny
Jesus wants to buy the world for a song

I'm paywalled out, and I already subscribe to too much.

I was under the impression that Ensign Peak Advisors had $100B. Their land and business holding were in separate "reserves" - the word they tack onto all the legal entities that control various LDS assets.

If that is so, then $100B is likely a very conservative estimate of their total worth. If anyone has additional details from the article, please post them. thx

Yes.

This is the same story we discussed weeks ago. I am not going to pay for access to this WSJ story, but they probably just did their own review of the original leak and came up with the same estimate. But that was only part of the church's wealth.

The Ensign funds were worth about $100 billion, which was distributed as one would expect for a wealthy middle-aged investor: stocks, bonds, and alternative investments like private equity and venture capital. 70% liquid seems low from what I saw in the leaked documents; I believe the PE portion was about 8%.

But that was a discretionary portfolio and did not include the church's real estate holdings, which the leaker put at another $100 billion or so. So that takes us to $200 billion total. I guessed that the value of the operational companies that the church owns directly might be another $50 billion, putting the grand total at $250 billion give or take depending on the actual value of those direct holdings.

Just a guess, but it's probably a lot closer to the truth than $100 billion.

Neither Clarke nor other officials would provide The Journal with details on the size of the church’s annual budget or how much money goes to Ensign Peak. But, the paper reported, they “gave estimates for its main areas of expenditure that, collectively, total about $5 billion.”

In recent years, the church’s reserve fund has grown by about 7% annually, Clarke told The Journal, mainly from returns on existing investments, not member donations.

The fund’s handlers are instructed not to invest in industries that Latter-day Saints consider objectionable — including “alcohol, caffeinated beverages, tobacco and gambling,” he said, alluding in part to the church’s health code known as the Word of Wisdom, which bars those substances (although caffeinated sodas are not part of that prohibition).

Some of the stocks in which Ensign has invested millions include Apple Inc., Chevron Corp., Visa Inc., JPMorgan Chase, Home Depot, Amazon and Google, according to the article.

Clarke and former Ensign employees said the firm created a system of more than a dozen shell companies to make its stock investments harder to track. That strategy, Clarke said, was designed to prevent members from parroting what Ensign was doing and to, as the paper stated, “protect them from mismanaging their own funds with insufficient information.”

Here are some other takeaways from The Journal story:

• Ensign Peak’s holdings include “$40 billion of U.S. stock, timberland in the Florida Panhandle and investments in prominent hedge funds.”

• Latter-day Saint officials acknowledged that it used Ensign funds to underwrite construction of City Creek Center mall in downtown Salt Lake City and rescue Beneficial Life, a church-owned insurance company, but said there was nothing illegal in that.

• Former employees said the fund mushr0omed from about $40 billion in 2012 to around $100 billion by 2019.

• Church officials said the global faith, as a whole, gives about $1 billion a year to “humanitarian causes and charities.”

The deliberately altered word is apparently banned.

“gives about $1 billion a year”

Wait, didn’t the church just say that since 1980 it’s spent $2 billion? That’s a steep growth curve.

The purpose of closed financials is so they can lie.

I like the way [I] put it. He wrote that "the global faith, as a whole, gives about $1 billion a year."

That is a statement that includes not just the church but also the members. The Q15 are again taking credit for what individual Mormons do out of the goodness of their collective heart.

In fairness, that wasn't my description. That was a statement from the SL Trib article.

And now for something really different.

How do you make the vertical line in your moniker?

Shift + \key.
For IPad, it's numbers then the symbols and the third symbol from the left on the second row.

Got it. Thanks!

"that it used Ensign funds to underwrite construction of City Creek Center mall in downtown Salt Lake City and rescue Beneficial Life,"

This is where I think the IRS may get them (funding of City Creek and Beneficial Life bail out). The church can claim they are within the law all they want, but it will be interesting to see what happens with these apparent breaches in tax law. It may take years though before it becomes known.

>
> • Church officials said the global faith, as a
> whole, gives about $1 billion a year to
> “humanitarian causes and charities.”

They collect 10% (income) of their members' income.
They donate (expenditures) 10%.

Not a bad return on the money.

The reason that they gave regarding the creation of shell companies, to protect the Saints from copying the church's investment strategies, seems to be an admission that the church does not believe ghawd guides them when it comes to investing 'his' money!

It's either that or they are admitting that their just guessing.

Stunning article. WSJ interviewed the head of Ensign Peak (and others). Among other things, he openly admits things the Church had previously denied:

*The Church WAS trying to keep its wealth secret.
*The Church indeed does NO charity with the money.
*The Church has NO plans for charitable use of the fortune.
*They DID use it to fund their mall and insurance company.
*They DO go to great lengths to conceal Church wealth for fear of losing tithes.

The article notes that Ensign Peak is the third-largest investment fund in existence. The Church points out that all of this is completely legal. Maybe, but "legal" is not the same as honorable, ethical, or Christ-like. Doesn't even follow the teachings of the Bible or the Book of Mormon to use our means to help others. Shameful....

Another example of honesty only when there is no other alternative. A sad pattern in TSCC.

How is that not illegal? Oh right, religion. America’s money laundromat. It’s nice to see the dedication to their God.

Two things that stood out to me in the article...

1. Many charitable organizations partially fund operating costs from their investment portfolio. The Mormon church had surplus on the operating side.

2. During the downturn in the economy several years ago the Church didn’t dip into investment funds to finance operations, instead they cut spending.

I would expect and understand if a for profit entity behaved like that but not a charitable organization.

They make me ill.

So many families embroiled in strife and hardships to pay tithing to these whoremongers.

Keeping the WoW while being drunk on the wine of her fornication.

I mentioned this once before. DW ran into a member we knew years ago. This unfortunate active Mormon is selling her house so she can have enough money to live. It is a modest under $200 k home. If she only put the 10% into savings for the past 25 years since we were active, she would be fine. The Mormon corporation has significantly hurt this woman and family and it has the gall to keep asking for more when it clearly does not need the funds.