Shares in Schiehallion (MNTN ), the $590m (£473m) Baillie Gifford private equity investment company, received a much-needed boost today after its second-biggest investment, US-based games developer Scopely, was bought by a Saudi company for $4.9bn (£3.9bn).

At the end of February, Schiehallion held 10.2% of its assets in the free-to-play maker of games such as Marvel Strike Force, Stumble Guys, and Star Trek: Fleet Command.

News that Savvy Games Group, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, had bought the Californian company saw the ordinary shares in the US dollar-denominated fund rise 6.2%, or 4.6 cents, to 80 cents.

Its C-shares (MNTC ), which represent a separate pool of investments that did not include Scopely, fell 2.75% to 39 cents.

Before today the ordinaries had slumped 57% in the past year as growth stocks were sold off in the face of rising inflation and interest rates and investors grew wary of the lag in valuing the unquoted companies that Schiehallion largely holds. 

The C-shares have done worse, losing two-thirds over 12 months. 

The massive declines, which continued in the first quarter of this year, are largely due to poor investor sentiment in the bear market. Baillie Gifford has explained in relation to its flagship Scottish Mortgage Trust (SMT ), which co-invests with Schiehallion in companies such as payments processor Stripe and EV battery maker Northvolt, that its valuations of unquoted companies are kept up to date through a rolling three-month review programme.

According to data from Numis Securities, the monthly updated net asset values (NAV) for Schiehallion show a far smaller 21.4% drop in the ordinaries and 15% for the C-shares. At yesterday’s close that left the shares trading on wide discounts to NAV of 33% and 48% respectively.

Peter Singlehurst, the Baillie Gifford head of private companies who manages Schiehallion, has not yet responded to a Citywire request for comment. It is possible the valuation of Scopely was already marked up by Schiehallion ahead of the announcement as its weighting in the portfolio rose from 5.2% at the end of January, according to annual results last week.

At that point, the Scopely holding was worth $60.2m, up from $47.9m a year earlier, but down from $66.4m last July. The variations could be affected by changes in valuation or currency movements between the dollar and the pound. 

This is Savvy’s third big investment this year, having bought esports platform Vindex and a stake in esports agency VSPO, according to the Financial Times. 

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) is chaired by the country’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman who US intelligence believes ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018.