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"Wall Street seems generally upbeat about the EA buyout, expecting PIF to draw from its vast resources and drive meaningful value from the transaction," Venema said.
The PIF, which already held a 9.9% equity stake in EA, was formed in 1971 to diversify Saudi Arabia's economic interests through international investment. In recent years, PIF investments have flooded billions into sports team takeovers, esports tournaments, film partnerships, and sizable ownership stakes in videogame companies like Take-Two, Nexon, Capcom, Nintendo, and more—efforts that have been criticized as attempts to launder the country's infamous record of human rights violations as it seeks to lessen its reliance on oil.
Saudi Arabia's crown prince, prime minister, and de facto ruler Mohammed bin Salman, who the CIA concluded had ordered the assassination and dismemberment of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, also serves as the PIF's chairman. In 2024, a US Department of State report found that, under bin Salman, there had been "no significant changes in the human rights situation in Saudi Arabia," characterized by credible reports of extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests, torture, press censorship, and restrictions on freedom of expression.