Dan Friedkin, the stunt-pilot billionaire circling Everton FC
US car sales tycoon and AS Roma proprietor owns Hollywood production studios and flew a Spitfire in film ‘Dunkirk’
Romelu Lukaku received a rapturous welcome in Italy last summer after signing for AS Roma. But the football fans thronging Ciampino airport were seeking a glimpse not only of their new Belgian striker but also his pilot — Dan Friedkin, the club’s buccaneering owner.
Now the Hollywood producer, stunt pilot and scion of a car-sales empire is in exclusive talks to buy Everton FC, the Liverpool club where Lukaku hit the big time, according to three people with knowledge of the matter, in a deal that would be the latest to propel a US billionaire into the English Premier League.
As private equity firms, sovereign wealth funds and the super-rich have poured capital into football, the buying and selling of clubs has become a spectacle to rival that of player transfers. Everton is newly available after troubled Miami investment firm 777 Partners failed to complete a takeover from British-Iranian owner Farhad Moshiri.
Friedkin’s wealth — Forbes puts his fortune at $6.1bn — stems from Gulf States Toyota, founded in 1969 by his late father Tom, which has grown to become one of the world’s biggest distributors of the Japanese carmaker’s vehicles and parts.
Its parent company, The Friedkin Group, whose revenues totalled $13.3bn in 2023, according to a person close to the business, also spans golf courses, luxury resorts and a safari company in Tanzania, although automotive still provides the bulk of the conglomerate’s revenues.
Born in 1965, Friedkin comes from a long line of aviator-businessmen. His father was also a stunt pilot, while his grandfather Kenneth founded Pacific Southwest Airlines, a pioneer in low-cost flight.
After a bachelors degree from Georgetown University and a masters in finance from Rice University, Friedkin took the reins of the family empire in 1995, succeeding his father, who became chair until his death in 2017.
Alongside the car business, he has made a splash in Hollywood. A co-producer of Killers of the Flower Moon, the epic 2023 western directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Friedkin is also behind film studios Imperative Entertainment and Neon, producer of 2019’s South Korean Oscar-winning Parasite.
And his flying expertise and plane collection won him a role in Dunkirk, the 2017 portrayal of the second world war rescue of more than 338,000 Allied soldiers, in which he landed a Spitfire on the beach.
“We got in touch with a chap called Dan Friedkin who owns six Spitfires and is a fantastic flyer,” director Sir Christopher Nolan wrote at the time. “We got him to talk about the characteristics of the planes, how they flew, what g-forces the pilot can really sustain.”
But the €591mn acquisition of Roma in 2020 brought a new level of international recognition to Friedkin, who despite his glamorous credentials is described by people who have worked with him as a “private person”. One said he is “very poised, not the first guy to speak but when he does he’s always adding value”.
Friedkin brings a similar passion to football as he does to aviation, according to one senior figure in the sport who knows him.
“He’s not doing it for fun and games. He feels every ball that’s kicked. When you’re with him and there’s a Roma match on, he’s got it on his phone,” the person said. “He’s a master of many trades [but] he knows what he doesn’t know. His instincts as to who the right people are in football are improving over time.”
In his short time as Roma’s owner, Friedkin has hired and fired Portuguese manager José Mourinho, reinforced the squad, decreased external debt and outlined plans to build a new stadium. Lina Souloukou, the Greek chief executive of Roma, previously told the Financial Times that the Friedkins “see themselves as custodians of an institution loved by the fans”.
Despite winning the Europa Conference League and finishing runner-up in the Europa League, Roma has failed to appear in Europe’s top competition, the Uefa Champions League, since 2019.
The club reported net losses of more than €200mn in the financial year to the end of June 2020. Almost four years since the takeover, it is still battling to be financially sustainable — although it more than halved its full-year net loss to just over €100mn in 2022-23, as revenues jumped by more than a third to €277mn, including net gains from selling players of €47mn.
Football Benchmark, the consultancy, values Roma at €574mn-€633mn including debt, and Everton at €519mn-€574mn. But Everton is constructing a new home ground, an asset that is a “huge attraction” to Friedkin, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.
Everton’s finances have been precarious in recent years. The riverside Bramley-Moore Dock stadium strained the club’s finances at a time when revenues were plunging during pandemic lockdowns. The club, nicknamed the Toffees, took another hit when Moshiri was forced to cut sponsorship deals with companies linked to his former business partner, Uzbek-Russian billionaire Alisher Usmanov, following the full-blown invasion of Ukraine. And like Roma, it has been disciplined over its failure to comply with financial regulations that cap a club’s losses.
Friedkin is conducting due diligence. “It’s absolutely not a done deal,” one person warned.
Friedkin has also taken an interest in the sport beyond the confines of Rome, sitting on the board of the influential European Club Association, rubbing shoulders with some of the most senior executives in the sport. And representing the ECA in its joint venture with Uefa gives him a key role in the company that manages and exploits the commercial rights of the governing body’s club competitions.
But his potential acquisition of Everton threatens to reignite debate about so-called multi-club ownership.
Fans fear owners will prioritise one club over another, while football authorities worry about the integrity of European competition, particularly when it comes to the possibility of teams within the same ownership group playing against each other.
Friedkin is aware of the concerns, according to the football executive who knows him. But while Roma has performed well in European competitions in recent seasons, Everton has not come close, making a collision an unlikely prospect in the near term.
“If Everton get back into Europe, it’s a nice problem to have. He’ll have created value,” the football executive said. “He might not get it right the first time but he will get there.”