Recovery Board
: RfM
Recovery from Mormonism (RfM) discussion forum.
There were two feature articles in last Sunday's SLTrib about the wealth of LDS Inc, that I am surprised nobody else has posted about here, so I guess it falls to me, but I suppose I am sort of the numbers guy around here. There was nothing in either article that triggered my BS Meter. It all seemed well researched and pretty believable, especially considering how much the LDS Church h tries to conceal its holdings.
Here's the SLTrib links, though I am positive they will be paywalled. They are listed as "premium content", i.e. we paid good money to generate this article and it is for subscribers only. They do have a point.
The third link is to the Widow's Mite website. It is pretty bare-bones, but all of the data in the articles is also on that website, but you have to do some digging to find it.
https://eedition.sltrib.com/html5/reader/production/default.aspx?pubname=&pubid=4ade819d-942f-40e0-b9bf-543905485bdd
https://eedition.sltrib.com/html5/reader/production/default.aspx?pubname=&pubid=4ade819d-942f-40e0-b9bf-543905485bdd
https://widowsmitereport.wordpress.com
OK, now for the numbers (13 out of 40 paragraphs of first article are quoted):
>Ensign Peak now submits quarterly reports on a portion of its stocks, and those were worth an estimated $46.2 billion as of March in its latest filing.
>Applying investment benchmarks, Widow's Mite says the portfolio likely holds additional international shares and stocks that are externally managed, as well as bonds, hybrid investments and major stakes in private equity.
>The site says it also extends to real estate held by church firms such as Property Reserve, Suburban Land Reserve and AgReserve.
Among these properties are ranches, farms, offices, housing, hotels and industrial parks.
>Based on that mix, the site pegs Ensign Peak's value at between $150 billion and $175 billion in recent years. That's up from about $50 billion in 2010.
>Widow's Mite also estimates the market value of many businesses owned and run by the church — property management, insurance, publishing, broadcasting, entertainment and more — but concludes their value is relatively minor compared to Ensign Peak's immense assets.
>If Ensign Peak were viewed as the church's endowment fund, the site found, it is already large enough to support the church — independent of any member tithes or other donations.
>As to Waddell's explanation that the church's spate of new temple construction will place future demands on those resources, the site's authors say the church could build and maintain up to 1,000 temples (it has 315 existing or planned temples right now) by 2040 by allocating 10% to 12% of what it currently receives in yearly tithing donations.
>Widow's Mite also says Waddell's statement that the church intends to "double [its] humanitarian work again, and then again" was consistent with its analysis of the church's charity reports, which found a doubling of those expenditures in 2022.
>But the website's research identifies six major categories of landholdings by the church worldwide, amounting to a current estimated total value in property of about $102 billion.
Ecclesiastical buildings and sites — including chapels, temples, seminaries and religious institutes as well as landmarks such as Salt Lake City's Temple Square — make up the biggest share, at about $59 billion.
>Farms and ranches account for about $12 billion, with more than 2,800 properties, or 2.5 million acres — 85% of it located in North America.
>The site values Brigham Young University campuses in Utah, Idaho and Hawaii, along with Ensign College in Salt Lake City and related holdings, at about $10 billion.
>Known commercial real estate holdings, including the Church Office Building, residential properties, parking lots and industrial sites make up an estimated $6 billion in value, according to Widow's Mite. The church's nearly 400 mission homes and its flagship Missionary Training Center in Provo, meanwhile, are together worth about $2 billion. Unidentified church real estate of all types held under Ensign Peak and related investment funds are estimated to make up about $13 billion.
>With operating properties and investments included, the site found, church real estate accounts for about 17% of Ensign Peak assets, lifting the faith's current overall value to about $236 billion.
All the above quotes are from the first Trib article. I omitted the material about the SEC investigation, because that has been discussed here multiple times.
The second article is about how the material was amassed. and evaluations by some outside observers about the reliability of the data (tl:dr version - most sources are public, and are cited in the blog, so you can check original sources. There is some guesswork, but Widow's Mite points out where that is the case)
Here's the SLTrib links, though I am positive they will be paywalled. They are listed as "premium content", i.e. we paid good money to generate this article and it is for subscribers only. They do have a point.
The third link is to the Widow's Mite website. It is pretty bare-bones, but all of the data in the articles is also on that website, but you have to do some digging to find it.
https://eedition.sltrib.com/html5/reader/production/default.aspx?pubname=&pubid=4ade819d-942f-40e0-b9bf-543905485bdd
https://eedition.sltrib.com/html5/reader/production/default.aspx?pubname=&pubid=4ade819d-942f-40e0-b9bf-543905485bdd
https://widowsmitereport.wordpress.com
OK, now for the numbers (13 out of 40 paragraphs of first article are quoted):
>Ensign Peak now submits quarterly reports on a portion of its stocks, and those were worth an estimated $46.2 billion as of March in its latest filing.
>Applying investment benchmarks, Widow's Mite says the portfolio likely holds additional international shares and stocks that are externally managed, as well as bonds, hybrid investments and major stakes in private equity.
>The site says it also extends to real estate held by church firms such as Property Reserve, Suburban Land Reserve and AgReserve.
Among these properties are ranches, farms, offices, housing, hotels and industrial parks.
>Based on that mix, the site pegs Ensign Peak's value at between $150 billion and $175 billion in recent years. That's up from about $50 billion in 2010.
>Widow's Mite also estimates the market value of many businesses owned and run by the church — property management, insurance, publishing, broadcasting, entertainment and more — but concludes their value is relatively minor compared to Ensign Peak's immense assets.
>If Ensign Peak were viewed as the church's endowment fund, the site found, it is already large enough to support the church — independent of any member tithes or other donations.
>As to Waddell's explanation that the church's spate of new temple construction will place future demands on those resources, the site's authors say the church could build and maintain up to 1,000 temples (it has 315 existing or planned temples right now) by 2040 by allocating 10% to 12% of what it currently receives in yearly tithing donations.
>Widow's Mite also says Waddell's statement that the church intends to "double [its] humanitarian work again, and then again" was consistent with its analysis of the church's charity reports, which found a doubling of those expenditures in 2022.
>But the website's research identifies six major categories of landholdings by the church worldwide, amounting to a current estimated total value in property of about $102 billion.
Ecclesiastical buildings and sites — including chapels, temples, seminaries and religious institutes as well as landmarks such as Salt Lake City's Temple Square — make up the biggest share, at about $59 billion.
>Farms and ranches account for about $12 billion, with more than 2,800 properties, or 2.5 million acres — 85% of it located in North America.
>The site values Brigham Young University campuses in Utah, Idaho and Hawaii, along with Ensign College in Salt Lake City and related holdings, at about $10 billion.
>Known commercial real estate holdings, including the Church Office Building, residential properties, parking lots and industrial sites make up an estimated $6 billion in value, according to Widow's Mite. The church's nearly 400 mission homes and its flagship Missionary Training Center in Provo, meanwhile, are together worth about $2 billion. Unidentified church real estate of all types held under Ensign Peak and related investment funds are estimated to make up about $13 billion.
>With operating properties and investments included, the site found, church real estate accounts for about 17% of Ensign Peak assets, lifting the faith's current overall value to about $236 billion.
All the above quotes are from the first Trib article. I omitted the material about the SEC investigation, because that has been discussed here multiple times.
The second article is about how the material was amassed. and evaluations by some outside observers about the reliability of the data (tl:dr version - most sources are public, and are cited in the blog, so you can check original sources. There is some guesswork, but Widow's Mite points out where that is the case)
The amount of wealth the Mormon church has amassed is disgusting. And the top officials just can't see it.
What if they built a temple and no one came? They are almost getting to that point.
What if they built a temple and no one came? They are almost getting to that point.
Those numbers sound plausible to me. When we first learned about the $100 billion in Ensign Peak, I posted an estimate that the overall figure for church wealth might be around $250 based on typical business strategy.
A pension fund--meaning an entity that was looking towards the long run and didn't feel a need to disgorge resources to shareholders or creditors--would want to diversify its assets. If it knows its core business and considers it worth around $100 billion, putting as much again into liquid market investments would make sense. The non-religious businesses would be smaller. So at the time I thought the church was worth $100 billion in church real estate, $100 billion in market investments, and perhaps $50 billion in subsidiary companies, for a total of somewhere around $250 billion.
If you take a starting point of $250 billion now, meaning I may have overestimated the church's value a few years ago, and grow it at various rates per annum, you get this pattern.
Growth rate of 7% per annum: A trillion by 2044
Growth rate of 9% per annum: A trillion by 2040
Growth rate of 11% per annum: A trillion by 2037
But look what the power of compounding does over the longer term:
Growth rate of 7% per annum: Two trillion by 2055
Growth rate of 9% per annum: Two trillion by 2048
Growth rate of 11% per annum: Two trillion by 2044
This tells us that the church is quite conservative. If it were willing to take on riskier investments like a normal endowment, it could have two billion by 2044 rather than just one billion.
ETA: D'oh!
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2023 09:13PM by Lot's Wife.
A pension fund--meaning an entity that was looking towards the long run and didn't feel a need to disgorge resources to shareholders or creditors--would want to diversify its assets. If it knows its core business and considers it worth around $100 billion, putting as much again into liquid market investments would make sense. The non-religious businesses would be smaller. So at the time I thought the church was worth $100 billion in church real estate, $100 billion in market investments, and perhaps $50 billion in subsidiary companies, for a total of somewhere around $250 billion.
If you take a starting point of $250 billion now, meaning I may have overestimated the church's value a few years ago, and grow it at various rates per annum, you get this pattern.
Growth rate of 7% per annum: A trillion by 2044
Growth rate of 9% per annum: A trillion by 2040
Growth rate of 11% per annum: A trillion by 2037
But look what the power of compounding does over the longer term:
Growth rate of 7% per annum: Two trillion by 2055
Growth rate of 9% per annum: Two trillion by 2048
Growth rate of 11% per annum: Two trillion by 2044
This tells us that the church is quite conservative. If it were willing to take on riskier investments like a normal endowment, it could have two billion by 2044 rather than just one billion.
ETA: D'oh!
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2023 09:13PM by Lot's Wife.
Those are all Trillion, with a T
ETA: for the visually minded:
$1B is a tractor-trailer load of $100 bills
( 22,000 pounds of Benjamins)
$1T is a slightly longer than average freight train of boxcars full of $100 bills.
(22 million pounds of $100 bills)
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2023 09:17PM by Brother Of Jerry.
ETA: for the visually minded:
$1B is a tractor-trailer load of $100 bills
( 22,000 pounds of Benjamins)
$1T is a slightly longer than average freight train of boxcars full of $100 bills.
(22 million pounds of $100 bills)
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2023 09:17PM by Brother Of Jerry.
D'oh!
Double dog D'oh-ed
Yeah, but look at the bright side. If the mormon preppers and Ammon Bundy types achieve their fever dreams of societal collapse and civil war, all the church's money won't be worth a thing during the Long March to Missouri. They can't have it both ways.
The "Long March."
Please, please tell me that allusion was intentional!
Please, please tell me that allusion was intentional!
Yes, actually it was intentional. It was a last-second edit prior to posting.
Love it!
At least they can pay people to attend (pew actors) if needed to keep pretending they are a religion.
I wonder how they will react at General Conference time - STFU about the importance of tithing for awhile until the dust settles, or double down on how important it is that YOU continue to pay for your own spiritual enlightenment/safety?