(Bloomberg) — NFL owners delayed a vote on allowing private equity firms to acquire stakes in teams, thus delaying a potential influx of bidders and sources of capital for franchises.
A committee made of five owners hasn’t finalized a model for bringing private equity into the fold, but a vote is expected to come later this year, according to Kansas City Chiefs owner Clark Hunt, a member of the group. The league will likely vet and approve a selection of private equity firms to be potential buyers of stakes in teams, he said.
“We’ve made a great deal of progress,” Hunt said from the NFL owners meeting in Orlando.
The NFL has some of the strictest ownership rules in sports, which has made selling teams more difficult than in other sports that have already expanded ownership rules to private equity and other investment entities. That was apparent last year when a large group of investors, led by private equity billionaire Josh Harris, completed a complicated deal to buy the Washington Commanders for $6 billion. The sales process also didn’t attract many suitors, raising concerns that the league’s ownership model was limiting and would depress future sales.
Once private equity is approved, the league could see as many as eight minority stakes become available, an executive for one NFL team said in February. Some of the private equity firms that have been active in buying equity in US professional teams include RedBird Capital Partners, Arctos Partners LP and Ares Management Corp.
Hunt said having institutional investors as an option could help with funding stadium real estate development as well as other projects that the league may take on.
“If we have a project that is particularly capital intensive, that would be another source of capital,” Hunt said.
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2024-03-25 21:16:41
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