Saudi Arabia’s sovereign Public Investment Fund (PIF) has become the second largest shareholder in Nintendo, placing it in front of Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund and behind only Nintendo itself.
Bloomberg reported that PIF upped its stake in the Kyoto-headquartered group to 8.3%, increasing its position by 2.3 pps since the start of the year.
Akira Takatoriya, a Japan-to-Middle East business consultant, called it part of the Kingdom’s “long-term project to become less reliant on oil”.
PIF’s US$31bn investment portfolio includes a number of other notable video game investments, including Activision Blizzard Inc (NASDAQ:ATVI) and Electronic Arts, which comprise 9.4% and 6.3% of PIF’s portfolio respectively.
Nintendo’s output is generally family-friendly, but that aside, PIF is not known to exert influence over its portfolio investments, despite being owned by one of the most pro-censorship countries in the world.
The fund also owns US$1.2bn worth of shares (3.8% of its portfolio) in Take-Two Interactive Software, owner of ultra-violent and explicit gaming franchise Grand Theft Auto.