the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints commonly known as the Mormon church is one of
the world's biggest hedge funds involved in Shady business deals in opaque corporate practices in
2019 Christ of Latter-day Saints had a 100 billion dollar investment fund I think that the church has
built an Empire by deceiving people last month the Securities and Exchange Commission an organization
normally tasked with stopping and center training and stock manipulation find the Mormon Church 5
million dollars for failure to report stock Holdings that they had intentionally spread
out over 13 different shell companies to avoid disclosing the church's Investments if it sounds
ridiculous that a church would be charged for some of the same crimes as the biggest corporate frauds
in history then sit back because it gets a lot worse the Mormon Church collects 10 percent of
their members incomes as tax deductible Ties That means if a Latter-Day Saints church member pays
a 30 marginal tax rate on a 100 000 income they automatically give 10 000 of that to the church
every year seven thousand dollars of that donation would have ended up in their bank account but
three thousand dollars would have gone to the IRS that means that tight fisted Uncle Sam is
effectively subsidizing 30 percent of the church's income the church is not obligated to report how
much it brings in every year but a joint analysis conducted by Reuters and the University of Tampa
sociologist Ryan Cregan estimates that the number is at least 7 billion annually in
tithes and other donations made by their members it's important to note that religions don't pay
taxes not because they're Charities but because they're religions so they have their own kind
of code and classification by the IRS that makes it so they do not pay taxes and it's not because
they're Charities so that's that's an important distinction to make some of that money is used to
fund the church's religious activities like paying salaries to priests some of the money is spent on
maintaining Church facilities and some is spent on programs to help the community but the Mormon
Church consistently has a lot of money left over the excess money that the troop saves every year
is funneled into a trust which is managed by the corporation of the president of the Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the president is both the cultural and managerial leader of the
church and controls the company that controls the trust that controls the church's extra money the
holding company directly owns an educational division including Brigham Young University
a think tank called the intellectual reserve and the Polynesian Cultural Center which is an
lds-controlled tourist destination in Hawaii that was built on the intention to provide
employment and scholarships to Mormon students attending the nearby Mormon owned University
the last major asset owned by the corporation of the president of the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints is yet another holding company that is the corporation of the presiding Bishop
of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the presiding Bishop is kind of like Darth Vader
if the president was Palpatine both very powerful and wield immense Authority in the church but the
bishop still answers to the president and is a little more Hands-On in the day-to-day Affairs of
the church the holding company owned by a holding company also owns another holding company called
the Deseret Management corporation which is their private Equity division the Deseret Management
Corporation owned several for-profit companies outright including beneficial Financial Group
which is an insurance investment in Retirement Services Company Bonneville International
Corporation with Jones radio stations Nationwide and Utah Property Management Association see it
which is a real estate company that manages apartments and Commercial properties church
members are encouraged to use the services of these companies and that gives them a customer
base of 16 million without having to pay a penny in advertising the Bishops holding company also
owns agricultural reserves and farmlands real estate holdings suburban homes and the land
that the church's Temple sit atop combined all of the assets and companies listed so far are
worth in excess of 100 billion dollars but all of this is still missing one important piece of the
church's Financial Empire there is an unassumingly named company called Ensign Peak advisors which
is directly owned by the Bishops holding company this holding company manages more than 40 billion
dollars and is really one of the world's biggest hedge funds it is also the center of the sec's
recent accusations if you sell cheap sweaters like they do across the street at Forever 21
you pay taxes but if you're selling the invisible product of Eternal whatever no taxes so to recap
Forever 21 taxes forever 33 no taxes so it's time to learn how money Works to find out how the
finances of mega churches really work this week's lesson was made possible by raycon I've been doing
a lot of traveling to see family and friends over the past couple of months but I still need to stay
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box or go to buy ratecon.com hmw to get 15 off your raycon purchase enzyme Peak advisors handled
the church's investments into publicly listed Securities unlike Deseret Management corporation
which handles all of the companies that the church owns outright enzyme Peak advisor's biggest Equity
Investments are in apple and Microsoft but their 40 billion dollar fund has positions in hundreds
of companies and securities the church's hedge fund got into trouble because two decades ago
it created 13 holding companies underneath the investing company underneath the holding company
underneath the holding company underneath the trust underneath the church Ensign spread out
its Holdings amongst these companies to hide the skill of their financial Holdings the church can
get away with not sharing that much about their financials with the government because of the
whole church and state thing that means that the only way that anybody could figure out how
much the church really held was through a form 13f which is a filing that must be made with the SEC
when an Institutional Investor owns more than 100 million dollars worth of assets under management
13f filings are public information because it's important for investors to see major shareholders
in a company anybody with 100 million dollars or more of a company stock could significantly
affect its price if they decided to sell suddenly if a retail investor knows that an Institutional
investment fund has a very large position and a failing company who transitioned from a social
media platform to a conceptual VR company that might tell some people to avoid investing in it
that's why the SEC makes sure that this is as simple as searching on their website the name
of the Institutional Investor to find the 13f and get a list of all the companies they're invested
in enzyme Peak advisors didn't want to be on that list because it would reveal the scale of
their Holdings with a simple Google search so they spread out their Holdings amongst 13 subsidiaries
so that they never exceeded 100 million dollars worth of Holdings in a single entity and didn't
need to make a 13f filing with the SEC we have a term for this it's called concealment if 13f
filings were this simple every hedge fund in the world would do it so that their Market moves
don't become public knowledge the church probably thought it could get away with this because it was
a church and to be honest they really did get away with it so anything that a religious entity buys
whether it's a car travel anything like that they pay no sales tax on that the SEC find enzyme Peak
advisors 4 million dollars and the church itself one million dollars combined the fines amounted
to less than .003 percent of the church's total assets and less than .02 percent of the returns
the hedge fund likely would have made in the four years the investigation was taking place
the church did apologize and it acknowledged its wrongdoing and is now taking steps to comply
with the SEC requirements it also emphasizes in statements that all funds are invested solely to
support the church's Mission what this actually means is that because all of these investment
assets and holding companies on top of holding companies are owned by a church and all profits
get distributed back to the church this entire corporate structure is completely tax-free and
can grow unimpeded by the IRS since the church can't even spend the money it's making from
tithes and donations this Investment Portfolio is only going to grow larger and more powerful one
of the first things a bishop must do to help the needy is ask them to pay their timing the church
now has significant voting power in hundreds of companies senior Executives at companies that have
large Church ownership could easily be pressured into business decisions that help the church's
agenda which could be anything from conservative business practices to flattering coverage in the
media organizations they have a stake in the Latter-Day Saints are not the only church in
America to control immense wealth Eagle Mountain International Church is a non-denominational
Christian Church founded by Kenneth Copeland a preacher of the Prosperity Gospel Copeland's
Ministry does not have as many wealthy members as the Mormon church but each member is encouraged
to give as much as they can even if it's their last few dollars don't struggle with your rent
relax I have a covenant with God foreign Eagle Mountain church does not have a complex corporate
structure like the Mormon church either it is run more like a family business for the Copelands the
church moved its headquarters in 1998 to a 33-acre estate that was an abandoned Marine Corps Air
Station which does sound like a weird place for a church but it was really the Airfield that the
Copelands were interested in the church restored the runway and turned it into the Kenneth Copeland
airport where the church operates its five private jets again getting back to the comment you said
that you don't like to fly commercial because you don't want to get into a tube with a bunch of
demons do you really believe that human beings are demons no I do not and don't you ever say I did
the estate also includes Copeland's seven million dollar home which the church owns and gives to the
family rent and tax-free as parsonage if churches have such effective tools to build tax-free wealth
you might be wondering how you can start your very own John Oliver of Last Week Tonight ran a
segment on Prosperity Gospel churches including Copelands that ended up in him creating his own
church to get these sweet tax benefits but most of all praise be to the IRS that most permissive of
an agency this was just a comedy sketch but it really is that easy and people really do it no no
no no no not because we have to we have still not broken any laws by promising you Untold riches in
return for sending us money America it's a miracle I never wanted to talk about the Kardashians on
this channel and I have avoided it for as long as possible but the family's matriarch Kris Jenner is
the co-founder of the California Community Church an organization The prominent members of the
family have gone on record stating that they give 10 of their income to every year 10 of Kardashian
money is more than enough to keep the lights on in a small local church the California Community
Church has been charged in the past with state tax violations leading many to assume that the
whole thing is just a convenient tax write-off for the wealthy family Mel Brooks runs the nonprofit
Foundation AP Riley which funds the Church of the Holy Family which operates on a heavily guarded
17-acre estate in the Agora Hills of Los Angeles over the years he has donated Millions to the
church including ironically all the earnings he has made from his film The Passion of the Christ
small churches like these are very hard to find information on and the IRS deliberately does not
ask too many questions if you are starting to think that a career as a mega church preacher
sounds pretty financially rewarding and might be the right one for you then you are also probably
morally Bank enough to capitalize on America's worst drought to profit off water shortages to
find out how go and watch my video on the evil business of water trading a special thanks again
to raycon for making it possible for everybody to keep on learning how money Works what did
I'll tell you I'll tell you my Wanda it says the viewers at home must plant a seed a seed
yes preferably in the form of cash although we do take