Renaissance Technologies bought GameStop and AMC shares, the filing said

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Hedge fund Renaissance Technologies added a new long position in GameStop and significantly increased its position in AMC Entertainment during the first quarter, putting it in a position to benefit from the meme stock mania sweeping the U.S. this week stock market pulled.

Renaissance added 1,004,958 shares of video game retailer GameStop during the quarter, which were worth about $12.6 million at the end of March, according to a securities filing released May 13.

Meme stocks have soared this week after an account linked to Keith Gill, the central figure behind 2021’s previous meme stock frenzy, posted on social media platform X. The shares started losing momentum on Wednesday.

Quarterly disclosures of hedge fund managers’ stock holdings in 13-F filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission are one of the few public ways to track what hedge fund managers are selling and buying. The announcements are made 45 days after the end of each quarter and may not reflect current positions.

Shares of GameStop are up more than 93% this week and more than 300% in the past 10 trading days, meaning Renaissance Technologies’ stake could now be worth nearly $33.5 million if it maintains this position.

Renaissance also increased its position in movie theater chain AMC by 78% in the first quarter, giving it a total of about 8.7 million shares, the securities filing shows.

Shares of other companies including AMC, headphone maker Koss and food storage container company Tupperware followed GameStop higher. Like GameStop, many of the stocks have been heavily shorted.

James Simon, the founder of quantitative hedge fund Renaissance Technologies, died last week at the age of 86.

(Reporting by Carolina Mandl and David Randall, in New York; Editing by Rod Nickel)