“We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law.”

Sooooooooo?

Funny - I'm a tithe paying member, and it bothers me quite a bit, as it does most of the members I've had it come up with in my ward or work life. Regardless of personal blessings, if corruption (real or perceived) has found a foothold in the church or adjacent orgs, sunlight is going to be the only disinfectant that removes any doubt. We should know, as members of the church, where and how the widows mite is being used - not because it's our money (though you can make that argument),but because it is the Lord's and there's no reason to keep it secret or play shell games with it.

Clearly they need that 10% to keep coming in.

Wise man.  Always keep adequate hate in reserve.  You never know when you need to allocate 5%, 9% or higher to a special event.

It is called Utah.

Has nothing to do with honesty and everything to do with the dishonest corporate media using anything and everything to criticize the church.

I'm financially illiterate so couldn't really make out what exactly happened.

It seemed to say that profits were squirreled away by a non-profit LLC?

LDS does have a religious corporation but also a separate business corporation, as I understand.

10%!

They can get bent. There are people who actually donate six figures a year to a church? Forget that.

I’m sure that there are good and bad in the LDS community, I can’t think of any Mormon I have ever had contact with that I didn’t think was good people. Between my extended family and the Mormons I have met in life and when using the local Cannery all have been people I’d love to have for neighbors.


With the exception of my best friend’s brother and sister, I can say the same about the Jehova’s Witnesses I know too.

Soooo what?

It's obviously not that big a deal if the SEC hasn't said anything about it for this long.   My accountant once erroneously filed some forms incorrectly for several years. As far as I knew, everything was legal.   One year when I was audited,  the error was pointed out, and I had to pay a fine.  The error was remedied and life went on.  

It's almost as if the government runs it's finances so poorly, that they don't have enough money to support their LGBTQ research or fund Ukraine anymore.  so those 87,000 tax collectors got to go after  someone, and find any loophole they can to keep their pet projects funded.

So it's just a big investment firm making a few people rich

Jesus claimed to be God. LDS church does not believe Jesus was/is God, but a separate entity, they will say Jesus never claimed to be God, which is in dispute with the oldest most reliable writings of the gospel (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John). Either Jesus was delusional, lying, or telling the truth.

Ehhh if I did what they are doing it would be a crime.

Gov just mad they are not getting their cut.

NWO wants all religions abolished

Who do they think they are ? The Clinton foundation is a leader and will not be undermined or investigated

Yep, some of my family are still members and they are good people - the church just wasn't for me. Some of the biggest hypocritical scum I ever met were also in the church. A good buddy's mother was cheating with the bishop, and when his dad found out he went to church higher ups and said this dude needs to go. Stake Presidency told him it was God testing him and his faith. Meanwhile the bishop is the one questioning us on our morality during temple worthiness interviews. Bishop's wife also knew. I worked one summer for a landscaping company owned by a member, he would threaten customers and cheat me out of pay.

I didn't believe in the LDS church, and I didn't find it make me a better person. This latest news story reaffirms I made the right decision.

It’s in the name to give it credibility , if Jesus isn’t God then He can’t save us
The Mormon Jesus isn’t God - so ... you know the rest

Is it a non-profit? Does SEC regulate non-profits?

Boring.

Do Harvard, a $42 billion tax-free investment and government control entity masquerading as a university.

I was very interested to see what sort of conspiracy Local Dive Shops were involved with. This is far less entertaining.  

Any large revenue stream is going to attract theives.

"Are you honest in your dealings with your fellow man?"

If you're a member, you recognize that question, right?

I'm a member, too, and I am VERY concerned.

Here are some more specifics from the documents:

32. The Church and Ensign Peak continued to take the same approach to filing Forms
13F through the Clone LLCs despite two Church Audit Department ("CAD") internal audits of Ensign
Peak   one in 2014 and one in 2017 that reviewed the LLC Structure. In discussions with Ensign
Peak's senior management, although CAD did not recommend specific changes to the LLC
Structure, CAD highlighted the risk that the SEC might disagree with the approach.

35.  Ensign Peak continued to file Forms 13F through the Clone LLCs until February 14, 2020, when Ensign Peak filed a consolidated Form 13F for the quarter ended December 31, 2019. Ensign Peak's Form 13F consolidated securities previously listed on the various Forms 13F filed in the names of the Clone LLCs. Ensign Peak's first Form 13F disclosed its management of 1,659 Section 13(f) Securities valued at approximately $37.8 billion.

Here is the penalty that they were assessed:


A.        Pursuant to Section 21C of the Exchange Act, Respondent Ensign Peak shall cease
and desist from committing or causing any violations and any future violations of Section 13(f) of
the Exchange Act and Rule 13f-1 promulgated thereunder;

B.        Pursuant to Section 21C of the Exchange Act, Respondent the Church shall cease and desist
from committing or causing any violations and any future violations of Section 13(f) of the
Exchange Act and Rule 13f-1 promulgated thereunder;

C.        Ensign Peak shall, within 10 days of the entry of this Order, pay a civil money penalty
in the amount of $4,000,000 to the Securities and Exchange Commission for transfer to the general
fund of the United States Treasury, subject to Exchange Act Section 21F(g)(3). If timely payment is
not made, additional interest shall accrue pursuant to 31 U.S.C.  3717.

D.        The Church shall, within 10 days of the entry of this Order, pay a civil money penalty in
the amount of $1,000,000 to the Securities and Exchange Commission for transfer to the general fund
of the United States Treasury, subject to Exchange Act Section 21F(g)(3). If timely
is not made, additional interest shall accrue pursuant to 31 U.S.C.  3717.

To the exclusion of those that don't? No pay, no blessings?

Not that big of a deal? A $5 million fine not being a big deal - perhaps if you're sitting on just an investment account worth over $130 billion.

Your situation is not at all analogous to the situation that the mormon church was charged with. The highest level of church leadership was aware of, directed, and signed off on the scheme. From the SEC's order: "On March 15, 2005, the Church became aware that the public might link this first LLC to the Church because the person signing the Forms 13F was listed in a public directory as a
Church employee. To address this issue, on March 21, 2005, the senior leadership of the Church approved a new reporting entity to be created with “better care being taken to ensure that neither
the ‘Street’ nor the media [could] connect the new entity to Ensign Peak.” Notice this says the Church, not Ensign Peak, but the Church leadership did this - not an accountant, not a financial advisor, not an attorney, but the highest senior level of church leadership. Also notice that this timeline was before the multiple shell companies were created. The church leadership orchestrated the shell company scheme to hide the funds from their members and the government, but primarily from its members. There's no altruistic "stick it to the .gov man", it was all about hiding its finances to their tithe paying membership.


I was going to lay out some other key pieces that point directly to the top of the mormon hierarchy as driving force behind hiding the funds from their members, but there's far too many instances to spend all night here when I'm headed to the gym. Instead here's the conspiracy as told by SEC investigators and you can read all about the conspiracy or not: https://www.sec.gov/litigation/admin/2023/34-96951.pdf

When is the Federal Reserve going to come clean?

They say they are.

And for the sake of this thread lasting more than 3 pages, its probably best to just leave it at that. Or people will keep going and get banned as the dogpile that always happens, happens...

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Bullshit


The statement says the church went out of its way to hide it's money from the members and illegally set up shell companies

Just facts no spin

Well past time to eliminate the exemption of religious non-profits filing 990.

What am I going to do with 40 subscriptions to Vibe?

I know it.

Mussolini gave the catholic church their own autonomous zone, plus 90 million in currency.  He needed the vote.  They have since amassed tremendous wealth without taxes or regulation from anyone but themselves.

Some people in 1964 gave the vatican a seat at the U.N. as a permanent observer.  However, they have since been a state party of treaties.

The key whistleblower came forward in December of 2021, 13 months ago.

It's kind of amazing how much blind faith you have in church leadership. Especially after seeing the evidence that the church purposely hid assets in shell companies because they were (rightly) worried that members would stop tithing if they knew the church had "investments" worth 100 billion.

The catholic church doesn't have $100 billion of "investments" and hasn't been fined by the SEC. Maybe that's because they do real charity work..

I commend the SEC for busting disclosure violations instead of wasting time on that $47B FTX Ponzi scheme.

I drove around Salt Lake City and looked at the vast properties that the church owned.  The first thing I did was hit the google and find the net worth of the church.  Google knew.  Most church members probably don't look and don't know.  I have several neighbors that are LDS and they probably don't know.  

I goofed on arfcom about some elders that kept stopping by my neighbors house in a $100K truck to insure they stayed in line, attended church, and kept paying their tithing. I was almost gang raped by LDS arfcommers.  

My neighbor was absolutely floored when I told her the net worth of the church.  She cut ties a few months later.  

No soliciting sign has been on my door for decades for one reason.  LDS is soliciting, always has been.

Deflection noted.

Am I supposed to be worked up over someone hiding something from the government?

That I can understand.

I see what you did there and i was amused. That joke is gonna be around for a long while.

I’m willing to bet a lot of members of the church will be rather furious that someone or some group did not do things on the up and up. I think as others have pointed out, you’ll be hard pressed to find a church that has not had some issues on the business side. Doesn’t mean your rank and file member supports illicit business dealings any more than GD supports drag queen shows because they’re American.

Important to note respectfully that google could only speculate until late 2019 when the existence of the investment fund was leaked.

Everyone knew about the vast real estate holdings but the scope, size, and specific investments were kept secret even from some if not all members of the 12 apostles.

This is useful dry reading with only verified facts. No hyperbole and no judgment.

The widows mite report -LDS finances.

Well said brother. Only thing i can think is some idea of keeping it secret was to protect it but it seems counterproductive on the face of it.
Personally i think it’s good that the church has accumulated a large endowment. I worry more about what it might be needed for, than it existing,

Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's. That will get them a paddlin' for hiding funds.

It's their money and they can do what they want to with it, but I really do have to wonder what they plan to do with 130 billion dollars just parked in a fund. They aren't using it for any of their 'churches business' stuff like outreach, missions, etc.

Who cares?

The government defrauds us for trillions. I’m not Mormon but I support their efforts to keep their wealth private.

Also, having assets is not the same as income.  Start selling that to pay your massive bills and it won’t be long and you’ll be left with nothing.  Same thing with the Catholic Church.  What is the Vatican City worth?  Sistine chapel?  

Doesn’t matter and they shouldn’t be taxed on it anyway. Unless you think your assets should be taxed as income too.  My house is worth 250,000.  people who think I should be taxed on that as income are insane and stupid.

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