Ryan Cohen buys $20M worth of GameStop stock, bringing total ownership to 43 million shares

Ryan Cohen just wrote another eight-figure check to himself, sort of. The GameStop CEO purchased 1,000,000 shares of GME Class A common stock on September 10, totaling approximately $20.38 million at a weighted average price of $20.3759 per share.

The buy pushes Cohen’s direct beneficial ownership to 39,347,842 shares. Factor in an additional 3,734,784 shares derived from warrants, and his total stake lands at roughly 43.08 million shares, or about 8.5% of GameStop’s total share count of 504.5 million.

A familiar playbook

This isn’t a one-off burst of insider confidence. Cohen has been methodically loading up on GME shares with personal funds for well over a year now.

In April 2025, he bought 500,000 shares at an average price of $21.55 per share. Then in January 2026, he doubled that with a 1 million share purchase at $21.36 apiece. This latest buy came at a slightly lower average cost than either of those prior transactions.

Each purchase has been on the open market, with personal capital, not through options exercises or company-granted equity.

Cohen has been vocal about why he does this. He’s argued publicly that CEOs of public companies should invest their own money in their company’s stock to ensure their interests genuinely align with shareholders. In his framing, failure to do so should be grounds for removal from the position.

The $100 billion question

Cohen’s buying spree takes on additional significance when viewed alongside his proposed compensation package. The plan, which requires shareholder approval, ties Cohen’s future awards to performance-based milestones, including achieving a market capitalization of $100 billion for GameStop.

To put that number in perspective, GameStop’s current share count of 504.5 million at the recent purchase price of roughly $20.38 implies a market cap in the neighborhood of $10 billion. Reaching the $100 billion threshold would require something close to a 10x increase from current levels.

The next milestone to watch is whether GameStop’s shareholders approve Cohen’s performance-based compensation package. If they do, the $100 billion market cap target becomes the benchmark against which his tenure will ultimately be measured.

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