GameStop Stock Rises. It Wants to Be More Like MicroStrategy. — Barrons.com

By Brian SwintGameStop wants to be more like MicroStrategy — and those plans are boosting the stock Friday morning.According to CNBC, which cited people familiar with the matter, GameStop, a videogame retailer, is considering investing in Bitcoin and other cryptos. The shift would make the company more like MicroStrategy, which relies on Bitcoin purchases as a core of its business strategy. That might represent a more promising future for GameStop as sales of physical copies of games dwindle. MicroStrategy is booming — it even decided to change its name to Strategy, ditching the "micro" prefix that suggests a small size.GameStop gained fame as a "meme stock," so called because it gained popularity and saw big price gains without any significant change to company fundamentals, in 2020. The popularity was driven by a large number of retail investors, who bought the shares after being prodded by cultural items like pictures or cartoons that were spread on the internet. GameStop, though, struggled as its main business continued to shrink and new bets failed to pan out.Investors apparently like the chances of its bitcoin gambit. GameStop shares jumped 6.3% in premarket trading to $28, though coming into the session they're still down 16% since Jan. 1.Write to Brian Swint at [email protected] content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.