GameStop CEO George Sherman to step down
Move will occur upon appointment of successor
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GameStop CEO George Sherman will step down on July 31 or earlier, the company announced Monday.
The move will occur upon the appointment of a successor.
"GameStop appreciates the valuable leadership that George has provided throughout his tenure," Ryan Cohen, the incoming board chairman, said in a statement. "He took many decisive steps to stabilize the business during challenging times. The Company is much stronger today than when he joined."
Shares of the video-game retailer were up more than 6% in premarket trading on the news.
The board has made changes to its executive leadership to adjust to a changing business model in recent months.
In mid-January, GameStop Corp. added Cohen and two of his former colleagues from Chewy to its board after Cohen had pressed the retailer to focus on its online operations. That move contributed to the stock's meteoric rise. Shares have given up some of their over-the-moon gains since the big runup in late January, but are still up more than 800% this year.
GameStop's business has been floundering over the past decade with the rapid shift toward downloading games. That shift threatened the existence of GameStop and its shares had been more than halved, to $20 each, by the beginning of this year. But GameStop has been swept up in a battle between big-moneyed hedge funds betting against it and small investors trying to prop it up. That has caused GameStop’s share price to soar despite the shaky financials underneath.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.