GameStop just experienced a 41.21% surge that pushed its stock to almost $200. This price increase happened just as Ryan Cohen, former CEO and co-founder of Chewy, stepped up to lead GameStop's transition into an e-commerce business. The transition's goal is to turn GameStop into a big online retailer, meaning it can become a powerful competitor for Steam. This is part of a plan to save the company while it has been gaining attention on social media.
GameStop has remained one of the most talked-about companies as GameStop stock prices dramatically increased after a group of people on Reddit decided to invest in stocks, resulting in losses for investors who were betting against GameStop. Last January, GameStop's stocks increased by 1500%, reaching almost $500 by the end of the month, which was an all-time high for the company. During that month, Jim Bell stepped down from his role as finance director, although there was no official statement confirming if it was related to the company's performance in the stock market.
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Today, GameStop officially announced that its Board of Directors formed a plan to accelerate the company's transition to become an online business. Ryan Cohen has been trying to make GameStop directors change to an online-focused business. He even wrote a letter urging the company to embrace a fully online approach and capitalize on more technological aspects. Furthermore, Cohen emphasized the importance of the upcoming two years for the development and growth of the company. Particularly, Cohen foresees an opportunity for GameStop's sales to grow in a time when the industry is expected to reach $200 billion in sales by 2023.
Ryan Cohen has not been the only one who has taken an interest in GameStop. Other key figures in GameStop's road to increasing its digital presence have been Kurt Wolf, Hestia Capital's Managing Member, together with Paul J. Evans, CFO's Sevan Multi-Site Solutions. The two of them have been trying to be a part of GameStop's reform and went as far as creating a thorough presentation highlighting GameStop's recent underwhelming performance. Just as Cohen, Wolf and Evans urge GameStop to take action immediately in order to save the company.
Now, the committee in charge of GameStop's transition includes other big names besides Cohen and Wolf. Recently, Matt Francis, a key figure in Amazon's Web Service, to play the role of New Technology Officer. Furthermore, Cohen is expected to step in after Jim Bell's resignation last month, which means he would become GameStop's Chief Financial Officer.
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Source: IGN