00:011892 Holdings is a consortium of billionaires, including Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin.
00:10It's led by British Indian investor Amit Bhartia, who will be the new vice chairman.
00:16The 1892 Group bought its stake from U.S. majority owners Fenway Sports Group.
00:21They were originally thought to have taken a 30% stake of Liverpool, but new reports say they've acquired 38%.
00:29Either way, it represents a huge profit for FSG.
00:33In 2010, FSG bought the entire club for just over $400 million when it was weighed down by debts from
00:41its previous owners.
00:42Its current value is thought to be as much as $7.4 billion.
00:47U.S. ownership of Premier League clubs is booming.
00:51Ten of the 20 teams competing this season have American-majority owners, including the current champions Arsenal and also Chelsea.
01:00They were bought by American investors in 2022 in what was at the time a record-breaking $5.7 billion
01:08takeover.
01:09But two of the owners, Chairman Todd Bowley and Director Mark Walter, are now considering selling their stakes to the
01:15majority owners, clearly.
01:17And while we're talking sport and money, let's move to basketball for the world's biggest ever deal for a sports
01:23franchise.
01:24The same Mark Walter, who is at Chelsea, has agreed to sell the L.A. Lakers for $12.5 billion.
01:31It still requires approval before it can go through, though.
01:34While Dr. Dan Plumley is Senior Lecturer in Sport Finance at Loughborough University, I asked him about Jeff Bezos' involvement
01:40at Liverpool.
01:42I think we've seen him, obviously, try and get into American sport franchises.
01:46We know they are very difficult to acquire.
01:48There is an exclusivity factor, as there is with big European football clubs like Liverpool.
01:53So he seems to have turned his attentions here with this consortium to English football.
01:57And if you can't get, you know, one of the biggest American franchises in the world, the next best thing
02:02is to get one of the football clubs that are inside the top 50.
02:05And I think there is value untapped still in English football and across the European game that some of these
02:10investors are looking at.
02:12And, of course, the trophy asset of owning one of the biggest football clubs in the world.
02:16What would Jeff Bezos hope to achieve from this?
02:20I think there's probably a longer-term play here, and we've said that a lot with people investing into football
02:27clubs.
02:27So this potential here may be further down the line for a full acquisition.
02:31It does give him and the consortium a degree of control, even at 30% to 40%.
02:35So they will have a big say in the decision-making moving forward.
02:39There's the natural American tie-in anyway to FSG and the backstory there.
02:44And Liverpool have made huge strides commercially in that market in particular.
02:47So there are a few question marks in terms of the end game and, indeed, the long game.
02:52But I think if you look at the American angle to investing in professional team sports, particularly into European team
02:57sports,
02:58what they tend to do is try and look at a seven- to ten-year picture and re-evaluate
03:03from there.
03:03American investment in football, soccer, has never been greater.
03:08Why do you think U.S. investors are so drawn to this sport?
03:12I think the value proposition is interesting.
03:15We talk a lot about the American franchises and they are a bit of a close.
03:19They are higher in terms of valuation than European football clubs still.
03:23The Forbes list and other figures we've seen would testify to that.
03:27But there is value still in the European football ecosystem in particular.
03:31So there is a wider appeal to owning these football clubs.
03:34And, of course, if you look at Liverpool as an example, and the Premier League in particular,
03:39that is broadcast to over 200 territories around the world.
03:42So you do get a global appeal.
03:44And I think we've seen more wider movements in American football off the back of the World Cup
03:50and the momentum that's gone behind that.
03:52It is still an attractive proposition for American investors to get involved,
03:56despite the fact that some of these clubs sometimes don't make a lot of money year to year.
04:02As you were saying there, many clubs are not profitable.
04:05So why are they so appealing to billionaires?
04:07Is it a vanity project?
04:10Sometimes it can be. We have to be mindful of that, of course.
04:13There's a lot of power and a lot of egos at the ownership level, at the very top of football.
04:17And we can't ignore that.
04:19But I think in terms of the financial decision-making and where you look to potentially get a return,
04:24you know, if you're an investor, and even at the very highest level here that we're talking with,
04:28with Liverpool and Jeff Bezos and the consortium,
04:31you're probably looking to extract that value further down the line, potentially through a sale.
04:35And the majority of Premier League clubs have foreign owners.
04:39Is that something you see changing?
04:42Not in the short to medium term, potentially not even in the long term.
04:47I think the finances of the game now just dictate that that is the way of it.
04:52If you look at kind of, again, the question of who can own these football clubs
04:55and the amount of money that you need to, even by a mid-tier Premier League team,
04:59you know, we are talking multi-millionaires and billionaires nowadays.
05:03And that then naturally stretches the geographical market that you're looking for.
05:07And there are simply a few people in the world that have that kind of money at the very top.
05:12And then you can look to come down from there.
05:14So I just don't see, given the global shift that we've seen with the Premier League in particular,
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