MW These GameStop directors have followed Ryan Cohen's lead. The stock is rising.

By James Rogers

GameStop directors Alain Attal and Larry Cheng have increased their stakes in the videogame retailer and original meme stock

Two GameStop Corp. directors increased their stakes in the video game retailer, just a week after Chief Executive Ryan Cohen grew his position in the original meme stock.

On Thursday, GameStop's $(GME)$ Lead Independent Director Alain Attal purchased 10,000 shares at $25.75 each, bringing his stake to 572,464 shares, according to an SEC filing. On the same day, his fellow director Larry Cheng bought 5,000 shares at $21.54 each, bringing his stake in the company to 83,000 shares, according to a filing.

Last week, Cohen purchased 500,000 shares at $21.55 each on the open market, according to an SEC filing. The purchase took Cohen's GameStop stake to 37,347,842 shares, or approximately 8.4% of the shares outstanding.

Related: GameStop's stock is climbing again. This is why.

GameStop shares are up 2% in premarket trades after ending Thursday's session down 1.5%. The stock is up 132% in the last 12 months.

The company has had a busy few weeks. GameStop recently added bitcoin (BTCUSD) to its investment policy as a treasury reserve asset after weeks of buzz around the benchmark cryptocurrency. GameStop also announced a proposed private offering of $1.3 billion in convertible senior notes. Last week, GameStop said it had completed the offering and exercised an option to purchase up to an additional $200 million aggregate principal amount of notes.

GameStop, like movie-theater chain AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc. $(AMC)$, was a major beneficiary of the 2021 meme-stock frenzy, which sent the companies' shares skyrocketing. However, GameStop has wrestled with declining sales in recent years amid intense competition from digital gaming and streaming.

Related: GameStop finally makes its bitcoin move, and investors seem fired up

The videogame retailer's stock was boosted last year with the return of influential trader Keith Gill, also known as Roaring Kitty, to social media. Gill, a pivotal figure in the 2021 meme-stock explosion, described himself as a GameStop "believer" in June, in his first YouTube livestream in three years.

-James Rogers

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April 11, 2025 07:40 ET (11:40 GMT)

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