Ever since Fenway Sports Group were revealed to have opened themselves up to a full sale of Liverpool there has been a steady stream of potential suitors linked to a bid.
The developments, first reported by the Athletic, arrived on the back of FSG having been searching for outside investment into the club for more than a year, a project that they had engaged the services of major American banks Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to facilitate, with Mike Gordon having stepped back from his day to day involvement at Liverpool to aid with the process.
For FSG the search for outside investment and retaining their majority shareholding is still a major consideration and something that they continue to look towards achieving, although in creating a sales deck and opening themselves up to expressions of interest from potential buyers they are indicating a willingness to part company with the most valuable asset in their £10bn portfolio if the price is right.
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US magazine Forbes values the club at around £3.5bn, although just how much FSG would be willing to accept to sell the Reds varies from between £2.7bn and £4bn according to various reports. The reality is that they are worth as much as somebody is willing to pay for them, with the sale of Chelsea for £2.5bn earlier this year, with a commitment for another £1.75bn for infrastructure development, giving some idea of the strength of the market and where Liverpool may sit. Well placed sources in the US have told the ECHO that $4bn (£3.4bn) is in the ball park of what FSG may consider.
Liverpool have greater revenues and a far bigger global fan base, and they are also a club that doesn't need to invest heavily in infrastructure due to the investment in a new training ground and improvements to Anfield.
There is no sound rule for the valuation of sports teams, although what has been the accepted norm is purchasing them on a multiple of revenue. Chelsea, at £2.5bn, were valued at around six times their revenue when the Todd Boehly/Clearlake Capital consortium acquired them. Liverpool, set to post revenues of £600m for 2021/22, would be valued at £3.6bn based on that model.
US investors see value in the Premier League given the lower multiple of revenue required to acquire these assets. In the NFL, for example, the 2022 sale of the Denver Broncos saw them acquired at a revenue multiple of more than nine, with revenues of £433m for 2021 against a sale price of £3.95bn.
Despite the hefty price tag there have been plenty of names linked with a potential bid, some of them carrying more weight than others.
One name that has started to gain traction is that of David Blitzer and Josh Harris who, through their Harris/Blitzer Sports and Entertainment (HBSE) business were in the race to acquire Chelsea earlier this year.
The ECHO has learned from US sources that HBSE are 'mulling their options' over any potential move, although other sources close to the situation doubt whether any interest will manifest into a successful bid for the Reds.
HBSE have a track record in sport through ownership of the Philadelphia 76ers, while Blitzer and Harris both own 18 per cent each of Crystal Palace. Any deal to move on Liverpool would require them to divest any interest that they have in Palace, although Blitzer, when speaking at the Sportico Invest in Sports conference in New York last month, where the ECHO were present, hinted at their approach if a major Premier League asset became available.
"At the end of the day I love Crystal Palace, and people who know me well will know I love Crystal Palace," said the 53-year-old, an extremely well know figure in investment circles in the US.
"But there are a handful of teams/brands out there on a global basis, and Chelsea is one of them. The opportunity to invest in that particular situation with a very small number of people, frankly, given it was a complicated situation, we were comfortable giving that our best shot.
"We would have had to divest our interest in Crystal Palace had that come through. If that had happened it would have been a really sad day in one sense, but again back to the investment part it would have been a really interesting investment in terms of what's out there for Chelsea. Then I would have probably had to hide a little bit when I went to London."
There are also strong links between HBSE and Liverpool. Harris and Blitzer's consortium that sought to acquire Chelsea this year had former British Airways chief Sir Martin Broughton, the man who held the early chairmanship at Liverpool under FSG and was a key player in their acquisition of the club from Tom Hicks and George Gillett.
Wall Street financier Michael Klein was also part of the HBSE/Broughton bid for Chelsea, Klein having been recommended by Broughton for that chairman's role and having been a major factor in facilitating the deal for FSG to take over the club. There are strong ties that exist within the group to the current ownership and the club itself.
Blitzer, through his Global Football Holdings (GFH) investment vehicle, has ownership stakes across European football already aside from the investment in Palace.
Earlier this month GFH took control of Danish Superliga side Brondby IF, while they also have stakes in Spanish side AD Alcorcon, German outfit FC Augsburg and Dutch second tier side ADO Den Haag.
HBSE's interest in Chelsea was designed to have them as something of a beachhead when it came to a multi-club model, one that they already have in situ due to their existing investments. The Chelsea bid, which also had Indian entrepreneur and owner of the Sacramento Kings, Vivek Ranadive, as part of it, was pursued due to it being viewed as something of a bargain.
Another US billionaire that may well have had his interest piqued is that of Stephen Pagliuca, co-chairman of Bain Capital, which manages more than £130bn of assets globally, and owner of both the Boston Celtics NBA team and Serie A side Atalanta.
Pagliuca, 67, was another major player in the race for Chelsea before its sale and his appetite for a Premier League team in the future is, according to US sources, still intact despite a rather bruising bid for London club several months back.
The ECHO have reached out to representatives of both HBSE and Pagliuca last week around any potential interest in Liverpool but have yet to receive a response.
Another major US billionaire to have been mentioned as someone who will likely be monitoring the situation is former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, whose near £70bn wealth was derived in his holding and sale of Microsoft stocks during the company's remarkable growth period.
Ballmer, 66, is a passionate sports fan often found courtside at the Crypto.com Arena (formerly Staples Center) and after retiring from Microsoft after becoming a multi-billionaire due to his stock options he was the winning bidder for the Los Angeles Clippers NBA franchise. Historically, the Clippers have been LA basketball's poor relation and were a failing team for a long time, with Ballmer's arrival coinciding with an improvement in on-court performance and the acquisition of a number of high profile players during his tenure. The Clippers are also set to move to a new purpose built arena in Inglewood from 2024.
Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani, 65, was reported in the Mirror on Sunday to have approached FSG representatives over a potential deal, although reports in India suggest that link has been slapped down with a representative of his firm, Reliance Industries, telling India's APB News that the link was 'fake'.
Ambani, the world's eighth richest man with a fortune of around £90bn, was linked with a Liverpool bid back in 2009, something that was denied at the time by Ambani's representatives and former Liverpool CEO Christian Purslow.
There are names definitely ruled out, two of them from the Middle East, among them Bahrain's sovereign wealth fund Mumtalakat Holdings and Emirates Investment Authority, the sovereign wealth fund of the UAE.
British billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe, founder of chemicals firm INEOS and owner of French side OGC Nice, has ruled himself out of the running. The Oldham-born Manchester United fan was in the race for Chelsea and also expressed an interest in taking over from the Glazer family at Old Trafford.
RedBird Capital Partners, the New York-based investment fund that owns 11 per cent of FSG through a $750m deal struck in 2021, won't be part of the conversation either, despite having been erroneously linked.
The Gerry Cardinale-led firm acquired Italian giants AC Milan in a £1.1bn deal back in September and the ECHO has been informed that their commitment remains to that project and that they won't be divesting any interest in Milan, something that would have to happen for any deal to acquire Liverpool to pass.
Cardinale, who had tried to acquire Liverpool in 2008, had stated in 2021 that it would be a 'privilege' to own the club in the future but stressed that buying the Reds wasn't part of the thinking for their FSG investment. The landscape has shifted since then and with a new stadium the plan for AC Milan, RedBird believe that their acquisition of last season's Scudetto winners has a tremendous upside in the coming years.
Also not in the running are the owners of the Chicago Cubs, the Ricketts family, who had been another interested party in the bidding for Chelsea earlier this year. A family spokesperson told NBC Chicago last week that there would be no bid for Liverpool.
There has also been the suggestion that FSG's supposed willingness to sell has something to do with a potential move for the Washington Commanders NFL team that recently hit the market with a £4.7bn valuation.
FSG principal John Henry would be permitted to form part of an ownership group as an individual but FSG would not be allowed to bid on the team due to the NFL not allowing private equity in the league, as things stand. That is a rule that is up for discussion but one that will take time to change, with FSG having private equity investment from RedBird, Arctos Sports Partners and CAZ Investments.
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