With the leak of the $100 billion-plus that the church has invested in stocks and bonds through their investment arm, Ensign Peak Advisors, Inc., is there anyone out there that still thinks the church is hurting financially?

I always had a hard time believing the LDS Church is hurting financially. I firmly believed they were simply being scrooges with their expense cuts and tithing push.

How can a church that

a) has no paid clergy (excluding the GA's)
b) requires its members to pay 10% of their salary
c) is skimpy on it's actual charity work
d) has virtually no budget for its ward members

be hurting financially?

Did you think they were hurting financially before?

There were times (long ago) when ChurchCo was over-extended, first was when the Feds confiscated all 'non-religious' property adjunct to the polygamy decision(s);


Later, when they were building chapels like hotcakes, they weren't doing well either,

But those issues have been long time ago resolved.

The word on the street is that in the mid to late 1950s, financial wiz kid Henry Dinwoody Moyle spent the church into a very negative financial position.

1960's April Conference was the first time that no financial details were revealed.
      https://archive.org/details/conferencereport1960a/page/n93

Prior to 1960, the financial reports listed the church's expenditures in different areas. I don't see that they EVER gave any mention of the church's income, from any source. Here, in the 1959 Conference Report, is the way it had always been done
      https://archive.org/details/conferencereport1959a/page/n93


And here's the an explanation regarding the burden of financial failure was foisted onto Dinwoody:

"...Reflecting the optimism of his time, Henry D. Moyle (1889-1963), counselor in the First Presidency of the LDS church, approached every endeavor on a grand scale. He thought the Church Office Building should be twice its existing twenty-eight stories.

As overseer of the Church Building Committee, he spearheaded a bold spend-now, pay-later policy ("Build for the next ten years") on the assumption that larger chapels would attract more converts.

As head of the Missionary Committee, he encouraged youth baptisms, creating "concern among those who did not share his optimism," according to biographer Richard D. Poll, about whether "the tithes of new converts would replenish the diminishing church reserves." Ultimately these utopian views proved unfeasible. As the church neared bankruptcy, President David O. McKay found it necessary to relieve Moyle of all administrative responsibilities."
      https://www.amazon.com/Working-Divine-Miracle-Apostle-Henry/dp/1560851295

At its nadir, Moyle had the church heavily in debt; all the money they'd made 'lending' to the Vegas mob was gone and they owed millions.

Then along N. Eldon Tanner, elevated to the 12 in 1962. He was a financial genius if you equate genius with doing the right thing by not overextending yourself. One could wax as fulsome as possible about N. Eldon and still not give him his due.

As much as the church suffered under Moyle, they more than made up for it under Tanner. He took Moyle's "let's grow BIG" and applied sanity to it.

Tanner died in 1982. At which point, less-humanitarian financial wizards took charge and because of their lack of humility and humanity, the church is now in its current situation, richer than ghawd and determined to hang onto it, no matter who they hurt.


...well, that's how I see it...

Ex-CultMember Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Did you think they were hurting financially
> before?

Never. But I was raised in it and related to its modern architects.

No. But I did believe, and still do, that the cult leaders doing everything possible to cut spending. Back in the late 1970's and early 1980's during the energy crunch, I knew the cult decided to have one 3-hour long meeting on Sunday, instead of separate sacrament meetings in the evenings, and RS and Primary on weekdays, etc., for one reason only: to cut heating, AC, lighting costs in having the buildings in use. The cult leaders claimed that members would save on gas, not having to drive back and forth as much. They gave as an example to this, Australia, of all places, where members had to drive many hours in the Outback.

No, the Mormon cult is not hurting financially, but that does NOT mean they are using the funds wisely or responsibly!

Will we ever know exactly WHERE this 100 billion is?

People talk about it like these are liquid assets. Am I the only one who thinks this money has long been spent away on other Mormon businesses, speculations, and personal interests? I wonder, if LDS, Inc. were forced to write a cashier's check for all of its available cash, what would that amount be? Like Beneficial Life, Zion's Bank, City Creek Mall, what other investments, stocks, and speculations have failed?

We know some the money went towards bailing out their failing mortgage business, and towards the failing City Creek Mall. We know by the bragging church-owned media about many land purchases all over the world for the "global" Mormon church, and about the building of temples that are not needed, and the proposed "Moronization" and development of city areas in Philadelphia and other major cities, and the creation of entire communities in Florida, and a proposed community in Africa. A lot of us have seen Laie, HI. This is without information from RFM, without any research. Especially, Utah residents have been barraged with this information, and even the dumbest ones of us can add.

The GA's and their families are not hurting financially--we can all see the wild spending and luxurious trips that Russ and Wendy and their entourage are enjoying--we see the photos and read the bragging. The cult flaunts their numerous new fancy, oversized temples and grounds. The local SLC newspapers and media make a big bragfest about temple rennovations, even new carpets, and a temple will close down for many months. (Not that the temples are needed, anyway.) We see too many ward houses, barely used, poorly maintained by the members at their own expense, sitting on prime residential view properties, holding the land tax-free. I have, since childhood, regarded LDS., Inc, as primarily a real estate holding company. Land is the best investment of all, IMO, and the Mormon cult is very wealthy in land!

Look at the City Creek Mall, and all the hoop-la about that, and all the lying by GBH about the cost. I was TBM, and didn't believe for one second that our tithing money was NOT going to be spent on that business venture. I didn't believe GBH's estimate of the cost--I actually laughed out loud, when I saw that on TV, in a room full of Mormons. Did GBH and his cronies think we average people were STUPID?

Definitely, I do think the wards and the members are being hurt financfially.

A lot of it could be tied up in Mormon-owned enterprises, but the crony hedge fund is still funded at taxpayer expense. Hopefully such egregious abuse will spur reform of regulations.

I do think they are hurting financially.

As a student of the stock market and business watcher, LDS Inc is showing the signs of a dying business.

Everything we know about LDS finances are from leaks. The $100 billion “whistleblower” could very well be an intentional leak.

What is not be discussed is that anytime there is a pool of money, from a garden club to superpower nation, that money becomes a target. Wrongdoers look for the biggest targets with the least amount of corporate or government oversight,

Utah is the nation’s capital of securities, mortgage, and insurance fraud. Interesting that we have never heard of a major embezzlement scheme from the state’s largest target.

If I were to guess, pallets of LDS money is being flown out of the country on a regular basis.

We have no idea of how much is leveraged against real property holdings, and have no idea who the true LDS “power players” are behind the scenes. We have smoke and mirrors regarding “stipends” and BYU tuition for the “useful idiots” senior executive LDS management.

Churches are also the best system for money laundering. Who knows how many dirty hands are in the kitty.

The most ironic thing would be the idea that the only thing LDS Inc has not lied to their followers about being money.

I am of the belief that churches should be taxed as any other business. The $100 billion “whistleblower” has undoubted caused friction with the mega churches wanting to quiet the idea of church taxation.

At the very least, all churches-which use public services such as roads to their address, rule of law, and emergency services-should be required to make all of their finances available for public scrutiny.

Gheco still apparently believes they are hurting financially.

They didn't act at all like the whistleblower accusation was a fake divulgence. Methinks thou hast been sniffing too much conspiracy glue.

As for pallets of cash going to foreign countries - why would they do that. It is already tax free. What exactly would they be hiding it from? Not taxes.

And nobody deals with those amounts in actually cash. Hell, you buy a car with actual paper currency and everyone will think you're a drug dealer. Buy a house with cash, and they will think you and your extended family are drug dealers.

Billion dollar corporation purchase - you can't get your hands on that much cash. It's all ledger entries at that level.

BYU has a nationally recognized accounting program. The university I was at used a two volume accounting text written by BYU profs. I never took the course, but I skimmed the books. The course profs said that text was the 800 pound gorilla in the field.

I bet LDS Inc has some of the best forensic accountants in the business. They may have been burned by fraudsters a time or two, but I be more afraid that they would try to corner a commodity market. With that kind of money, you can literally buy all the futures contracts on smaller commodities. The Hunt brothers of Texas tried to do it with silver in the 1970s. They managed to spike the price up over $100 (in 1970s dollars) for a very short period of time before the whole scheme collapsed. They damn near got away with it. Yes, it is highly illegal, but you have to get caught first. You got $100B, you could do that.

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> They didn't act at all like the whistleblower
> accusation was a fake divulgence.

Trial balloon before the 100 billion leak.

https://kutv.com/news/local/mormonleaks-says-new-documents-link-lds-church-to-companies-worth-over-32-billion

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Gheco still apparently believes they are hurting
> financially.
>
> They didn't act at all like the whistleblower
> accusation was a fake divulgence. Methinks thou
> hast been sniffing too much conspiracy glue.

I have been installing some carpet with adhesive.
>
> As for pallets of cash going to foreign countries
> - why would they do that. It is already tax free.
> What exactly would they be hiding it from? Not
> taxes.

Not “they” Individuals with inside power over senile old men.
>
> And nobody deals with those amounts in actually
> cash. Hell, you buy a car with actual paper
> currency and everyone will think you're a drug
> dealer. Buy a house with cash, and they will think
> you and your extended family are drug dealers.

Right wingers are still complaining about $50 billion being sent to Iran by Obama. They carefully omit it was Iran’s money, unfrozen after the nuclear agreement, and apparently they would not accept a check.
>
> Billion dollar corporation purchase - you can't
> get your hands on that much cash. It's all ledger
> entries at that level.

Most illicit activities are done with cash. Banks cause paper trails.

The last two months of my mission were awkward. We ran low on boxes and were informed to ration the limited supplies of the book of mormon.

One of my first cracks in my shelf.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/09/2020 08:47PM by messygoop.