TheChek News Flow

Liverpool FC owner in talks to sell stake to Mittal family-backed consortium

Deal would value English Premier League side at more than $6bn

A consortium of investors led by Amit Bhatia and backed by the Mittal family is in talks to buy a significant minority stake in Liverpool Football Club, in a deal that would value the English Premier League side at more than $6bn.

The investor group headed by Bhatia, the son-in-law of steel tycoon and billionaire Lakshmi Mittal, has hired advisers to work on the offer and is in active talks with Liverpool’s current US owners Fenway Sports Group, according to people familiar with the matter.

The football club was expected to be valued at more than $6bn in any transaction, three people said, one of the highest in football history. The attempted deal underlines the continued appeal of England’s top-tier football clubs and the global reach of the Premier League.

FSG confirmed the consortium’s interest in a statement to the FT. “An investment consortium led, managed and represented by Amit Bhatia has expressed interest in making a strategic minority investment in Liverpool Football Club,” it said.

Bhatia declined to comment.

People familiar with the talks stressed that no deal had yet been struck and there was no certainty an agreement would be reached.

It would be the latest big-money deal in English football, following the £2.5bn takeover of Chelsea FC in 2022 and Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s purchase of a minority stake in Manchester United, which valued Liverpool’s arch-rivals at more than $6.3bn, including debt, in 2023.

Liverpool is owned by FSG, which is controlled by American billionaire John Henry, who made his fortune in commodities trading. His group bought Liverpool for £300mn in 2010.

FSG also owns the Boston Red Sox baseball team and in 2024 led a consortium in a $1.5bn investment into the commercial arm of the PGA Tour golf competition. In December last year, FSG sold the Pittsburgh Penguins hockey franchise to the Hoffman family for $1.7bn.

Ahead of the potential deal, Bhatia agreed to transfer his shareholding in Queens Park Rangers, which plays in the English second tier, to majority owner Ruben Gnanalingam. This is to avoid holding stakes in two clubs.

The Liverpool talks come two months after the Mittal family agreed in May to buy a minority stake in the Rajasthan Royals, the Indian Premier League cricket franchise.

Liverpool is one of the biggest brands in global sport. The club has won the Uefa Champions League six times and the English top flight a joint-record 20 times. Under FSG, it has undergone a turnaround on and off the pitch.

The club won the Premier League in 2020 when they were crowned champions of England for the first time in 30 years. Another title followed in 2025. Liverpool also won the Uefa Champions League in 2019.

Liverpool’s revenue rose to north of £700mn in the 2024-2025 season, a club record, from £613mn the prior year. Its commercial partners include bank Standard Chartered, German sportswear maker Adidas and Google Pixel. 

FSG sold a minority stake in September 2023 to US private equity firm Dynasty Equity.

Intergovernmental agency says ‘no room for complacency’ and points to tightness in refined products

The International Energy Agency has warned of a growing risk to energy supplies following the escalation of the war in the Middle East, with the renewed shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz once again severely restricting shipments from the Gulf.

The intergovernmental agency said in a rare statement on Tuesday that while the crude market was benefiting from some “cushioning factors”, such as the continuation of an emergency oil stock release by member governments, it was “closely monitoring the situation” in markets.

“The escalation in hostilities affecting the Strait of Hormuz and energy infrastructure in the region increases security of supply concerns and uncertainty over the market outlook,” said IEA executive director Fatih Birol.

“There is no room for complacency on oil security amid the escalation in hostilities and a continued drawdown of available commercial inventories,” he added.

The statement will fuel speculation that the IEA is examining potential options if the strait does not open quickly, including further stock releases by members.

The IEA described the shutdown of the strait as the biggest supply disruption in history earlier in the war, and helped co-ordinate the largest release of emergency government oil stocks in history in March.

Birol said about 290mn barrels of the planned 400mn barrel emergency release had been drawn down so far, but said IEA members still held “in reserve” over “1bn barrels of government-controlled stocks”.

Oil prices fell sharply after a preliminary ceasefire in mid-June, with Brent crude dropping to around $70 a barrel — down from a high above $126 a barrel early in the war. But prices have since rebounded to about $90 a barrel, as traffic again slows to a trickle in the strait, with Iran striking a number of tankers in recent days.

The renewed closure of the waterway comes as oil and natural gas inventories have already been diminished, and the IEA said only an “unconditional” reopening of the passageway from the Gulf could stop “a further deterioration in global energy security”.

The US resumed air strikes against Iran two weeks ago and there has been an escalation in tit-for-tat attacks between the sides over control of the narrow waterway at the mouth of the Gulf through which a fifth of the world’s oil usually passes.

As attacks on energy assets in the Gulf and shipping have intensified in recent days, Yemen’s Houthi rebels have said they will impose a “maritime embargo” against Saudi Arabia’s ports, threatening an important lifeline for crude exports from the kingdom when the strait is impassable.

Saudi Aramco has exported nearly 5mn barrels a day through the Saudi port of Yanbu on the Red Sea during the Iran war, according to data from Kpler, the energy data company. Before the war the kingdom exported about 7mn b/d of crude.

“Threats to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait [at the mouth of the Red Sea], which has become increasingly important as a route to bypass the Strait of Hormuz, exacerbate these concerns further,” said Birol.

He also highlighted that petrol and diesel markets were much tighter than crude oil, and that Europe had struggled to refill natural gas storage sites ahead of winter due to a drop in Middle Eastern supplies.

The price premium for diesel over crude oil from refineries in north-west Europe hit a record high in recent days, reaching more than $80 a barrel and meaning diesel is changing hands for about $170 a barrel.

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Press Review — Tuesday, 21 July 2026

Backdrop: red-hot M&A

Le Monde's econ page leads on a "megadeal frenzy": global M&A +42% to $2.9tn in H1 2026 (PitchBook), best half since 2018; BofA sees the year near ~$6tn. France outperforms at +57% to €106.6bn (LSEG). Key read-through: no summer lull, financing open, and friendlier antitrust posture (April EU consultation on a pro-"European champions" doctrine) — compressing regulatory risk premia on several spreads. Pipeline skewed to defense, healthcare, bancassurance.

Announced deals / live spreads

Special situations / activism / restructuring

Sovereign deal-blocking risk (France)

Important signal for foreign bidders on strategic assets: l'Opinion leads on Loar Holdings (US) buying LMB Aerospace, reviving the FDI-screening / golden-share debate — a reminder the State blocked EQT's sale of Eutelsat's terrestrial infra in January 2026. Economic-security doctrine tightening. Related: DGSI drops Palantir for France's Chapsvision (sovereignty, "kill switch" fears). Chapsvision — 29 acquisitions since 2019, more European buys coming, IPO targeted before 2030 — is a consolidator to watch. (La Tribune)

Sourcing — French assets on the block

Funds in sell mode: Sandaya (InfraVia), Idex (Antin), Aroma-Zone (Eurazeo). Mid-cap: TechnicoFlor buys Azur Fragrances (Grasse perfumery build-up). (La Tribune)

Regulatory / defense / events

US specialist venture firm Dimension Capital raises $800mn fund to back AI-designed medicines

Investors are pouring fresh money into AI-driven drug discovery even though the technology has yet to produce an approved medicine, as specialist venture firm Dimension Capital has raised one of the biotech sector’s largest dedicated funds.

The San Francisco and New York-based firm has closed an $800mn third fund, betting on computational biotech — companies using AI as the primary tool to discover new medicines rather than conventional lab methods.

The fund underscores growing investor enthusiasm for the niche, which attracted $2.2bn of venture funding in 2025, up from $599mn two years earlier.

Dimension has become one of the most active investors in computational biotech, making more early-stage investments in the sector between 2024 and the first half of 2026 than venture firms including Khosla Ventures and General Catalyst. The new fund will write cheques ranging from less than $10mn to as much as $100mn.

Zavain Dar, a co-founder of the fund, said big venture rivals are pivoting away from software businesses amid worries about a “SaaSpocalypse”, which refers to a sell-off of software-as-a-service companies most threatened by AI.

“As SaaS businesses get hit, there is a rotation of talent into machine learning and AI,” Dar said. “Five to six years ago, what would have been backwater industries are attracting the smartest people on the planet.” And as people shift “you see the rotation of capital” as well, he said.

The rush of investment comes as large pharmaceutical companies including Eli Lilly and AstraZeneca have struck partnerships with AI companies to help identify new medicines. Around 850 AI-developed drugs are in progress globally, according to UBS, but none has yet won regulatory approval in the US.

The sector has also attracted more traditional tech investors. In January, Andreessen Horowitz launched a $700mn fund to invest in businesses applying AI to biotech and healthcare.

“Enthusiasm has increased and so has the opportunity for other investors coming in,” said Jonathan Norris, a managing director at HSBC. While increased competition could make it harder for specialist investors to win deals, firms such as Dimension had established themselves as leading backers of computational biotech, he said.

Dimension’s investments include Earendil Labs, a Chinese-US biotechnology company developing AI-designed immune and oncology medicines, which raised $787mn in March in the largest fundraising this year by a US or European biotech company.

It also backed Coefficient Bio, which was acquired by Anthropic in April, and Chai Discovery, whose investors include OpenAI. Dimension has funded NewLimit, a genetic reprogramming start-up co-founded by Coinbase chief executive Brian Armstrong.

For Dimension, “there’s a lot of fast followers to their thesis”, Norris said. But multiple businesses in their portfolio have raised additional money, he said. “That’s getting people excited.”

Injectables ‘wild west’: Galderma’s race to tame the botox boom

Swiss producer is training thousands of doctors to administer jabs as risk of botched procedures rises

Galderma has devised a system to help you identify exactly what is wrong with your face. Using a scale of zero to three, the Swiss injectables maker grades the severity of issues such as sagging, wrinkles and asymmetry.

Keywan Taghetchian, a Zurich-based doctor who trains practitioners on how to use Galderma’s treatments, asserts that “beauty is very objective”.

Galderma is one of the prime beneficiaries of the normalisation of “tweakments” like botox and filler.

Sales of its injectables — which include botulinum toxin (equivalent to US company AbbVie’s Botox), gel-like “fillers” to add volume under the skin and injections that stimulate collagen production — rose 11.5 per cent to $2.5bn in 2025.

Clinics administering these treatments have become a fixture of high streets and shopping malls in the past few years. Doctors-turned-influencers tout new procedures on social media, posting close-up videos of people having needles inserted into their lips and foreheads. Hollywood actors appear to have stopped ageing.

In an interview at Galderma’s immaculate lakeside headquarters in Zug, chief executive Flemming Ørnskov said “the train has left the station in terms of people wanting to look a certain way, to augment what they want to augment”.

For Galderma, however, this surge in demand comes with risks. The company exerts little control over who administers its treatments, potentially leaving it exposed when they go wrong. Unwanted side effects of injectables such as botox range from swelling to a crooked smile or trouble breathing.

Naveen Cavale, a board member at the International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (ISAPS), said the injector industry was “a wild west”. The established companies did their best to stop their product getting into the wrong hands, she said, but there was only so much they could do.

Galderma is now racing to train up the fast-growing ranks of doctors, dentists and nurses entering the aesthetics field and injecting its products into members of the public.

The Swiss company was founded in 1981 as a joint venture between L’Oréal and Nestlé. After five years under the ownership of a consortium led by private equity firm EQT, Galderma was floated on the Swiss stock exchange in 2024.

Its shares have more than doubled since and Galderma has become the world’s second-largest injectables maker after US healthcare giant AbbVie, with a market capitalisation of about SFr41bn ($50bn).

The group’s shares fell 6 per cent earlier this month, however, after the US Food and Drug Administration turned down its application for the approval of Relfydess, a longer-lasting rival of Botox.

As well as injectables, which make up about half of group sales, Galderma sells prescription drugs for skin conditions, such as eczema and acne, and specialist skincare brands like Cetaphil. Analysts estimate the Swiss company will generate $1.1bn of pre-tax profit this year on revenues of $6.3bn, which would be an increase of 21 per cent on last year.

L’Oréal has reinvested with a 20 per cent stake. The beauty company’s chief executive, Nicolas Hieronimus, has said women who pay for the sort of treatments Galderma offers spend twice as much on creams and beauty products.

The two companies are capitalising on the booming business of longevity, driven by wealthy women typically between the ages of 40 and 65.

Ørnskov trained as a doctor in his native Denmark before moving into the pharmaceutical industry. He now hosts a video series, “Beauty X Medicine”, which “uncover[s] the science behind beautiful, healthy skin”, featuring guests such as Dr Jean Carruthers, who first discovered that Botox could treat frown lines. Her catchphrase: “I haven’t frowned since 1987.”

Galderma’s chief said its core consumers want to “age in a natural way” and is keen to distance the company from the “pillow face” look of those who have applied fillers liberally.

Galderma and AbbVie suffered a slowdown in sales a few years ago following a period of “filler fatigue”. Ørnskov said the company dealt with the slowdown by pushing Sculptra, an injection that helps stimulate collagen production.

It was first used to treat people living with HIV/Aids who lost fat around their cheeks and temples. Now it is a hit with users of GLP-1 drugs such as Ozempic and Wegovy who experience the same conditions from rapid weight loss.

Ørnskov’s contention that Galderma’s products give users a “natural look” is dependent on them being administered judiciously by trained professionals.

The ballooning number of clinics and medical spas offering injectables has drawn large numbers of untrained providers into the industry, raising the risk of botched procedures.

A University College London study published earlier this year counted 19,701 professionals administering botox in the UK in 2025, a jump of 437 per cent in just two years. Doctors made up 28 per cent of all practitioners, while the proportion of aestheticians injecting botox without a medical licence doubled to 24 per cent.

Parts of the US show a similar pattern. A study last year by the University of Central Florida and the American Foundation for Aesthetic Medicine found that the number of medical spas in Florida doubled over a four-year period to 1,038. Over three quarters of them were found to be run by practitioners with no training in aesthetic medicine.

Rules governing who is allowed to inject Galderma’s products vary. In the UK, practitioners do not need dedicated training to inject fillers, so long as they are a medical professional. Rules vary state by state in the US. Galderma says that, where possible, it only sells to qualified injectors.

The company said it wants to train as many practitioners buying its products as possible. In 2025, Galderma trained more than 100,000 healthcare professionals.

Stefan Schneider, analyst at Vontobel, said “the goal is to minimise the risk of adverse outcomes that could end up associated with the brand through social media”.

“These programmes are expensive and time-consuming, but they’re essential,” he added.

Galderma was raided by French authorities in April on suspicion that two of its Botox-like brands were illegally sold to general practitioners. The country’s rules state that botox must be administered by doctors with specialities in dermatology or cosmetics

Ørnskov said it was difficult to control where products ended up in France because they had to be sold through pharmacies. “France is a special situation,” he said. “We will do everything possible. We have stopped delivering to certain pharmacies.”

Another area of concern to regulators is a growing trend for so-called “baby botox”, in which young people procure the injections as a preventive measure, in the hope it will stop wrinkles ever forming.

Barclays analyst James Gordon said anecdotal evidence from clinicians showed growing use of botox among women in their twenties was helping drive overall injectables growth.

“When you’ve got people who might start a lot younger, then they potentially stay on [the jabs] for their entire life,” he said. 

A report by the UK government’s Women and Equalities Commission found that higher demand for cosmetic procedures, particularly among young women, has in recent years been driven in part by extensive use of social media, where practitioners advertise their services.

Ørnskov pushed back on concerns about Galderma’s role in driving this trend, arguing that the scale of its business was “a drop in the ocean” compared with the global cosmetics industry, as well as sectors like nutrition and wellness.

“We are such a small part of a colossal, monumental wave in society where people want to live longer, look better,” he said.

“And of course, the thing they look at every single day is the face.”