Nintendo's shares rose after the government of Saudi Arabia revealed that it was raising its stake in the home of the Super Mario franchise.
The development comes as Saudi Arabia is one of the Japanese company's largest outside investors.
The former's sovereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund (PIF), revealed that it is open to expanding its ownership of Nintendo and other Japanese video game developers.
Nintendo Shares Rise
The news was announced by Savvy Games Group vice chair Prince Faisal bin Bandar bin Sultan Al-Saud. The PIF currently owns an 8.58% stake in Nintendo and also owns stakes in fellow Japanese developers Koei Tecmo and Capcom as well as Korean developer Nexon.
A subsidiary of the Mohammed bin Salman Foundation also owns nearly all of Japanese game developer SNK. On Monday, following the news, Nintendo's shares jumped by 4%.
This was on the first trading day since the publication of the recent report. On the other hand, Koei Tecmo's rose by 3,6%, and Capcom's increased by 2%, according to Yahoo Finance.
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Currently, the PIF is in the process of transferring its stakes in Japanese gaming companies to Savvy Games Group.
This is supposedly to "create greater synergies." Faisal bin Bandar said that he sees an opportunity to work with Japanese companies in order to promote localizing their video games for other markets.
The PIF is Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund. It is responsible for managing more than $700 billion in assets. It is a key driver of the country's Vision 2030, which is a plan to diversify the nation's economy away from oil.
Saudi Arabia's Stake in Nintendo
The Middle Eastern country has been actively developing the entertainment business recently. These include games and animation.
One example is the creation of the entertainment city Qiddiya which will have a stadium, a Formula One track, and the world's first theme park devoted to Dragon Ball, 80lv said.
The latest development comes after PIF last year raised its 5.01% stake in Nintendo to 6.07% as well as its stake in Electronic Arts.
In 2022, it acquired a $1.1 billion stake in Embracer Group. The PIF was allegedly "walking away" from its $2 billion major strategic partnership with the company earlier this year.
The situation also caused legendary game creator Hideo Kojima to raise his eyebrows after meeting Prince Faisal bin Bandar last year.
The latter said at the Tokyo Game Show that it was important to keep the communication going and not rush into anything, according to Eurogamer.
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