Mark Walter, Todd Boehly to Sell Stake in Chelsea for $1.3 Billion
Clearlake Capital set to increase its majority holding in Premier League soccer team
- Mark Walter and Todd Boehly agreed to sell their combined 25% stake in Chelsea to majority owner Clearlake Capital for about $1.27 billion.
- The transaction values the English soccer team at about £5 billion, including debt, and will hand Walter and Boehly almost $650 million each.
- Clearlake’s greater control of Chelsea paves the way for a decision on building a new stadium or redeveloping Stamford Bridge.
Mark Walter and Todd Boehly have agreed to sell their combined 25% stake in English soccer team Chelsea in a deal that will hand the two billionaires around $650 million each.
Chelsea said late Wednesday that Walter and Boehly were selling their holdings to Clearlake Capital, the California-based private-equity firm that is already the team’s majority owner. Existing shareholder Hansjorg Wyss will retain his minority holding as part of the deal.
Clearlake is paying about £950 million, equivalent to roughly $1.27 billion, to buy out Walter and Boehly in a transaction that values Chelsea at about £5 billion, including debt, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Walter and Boehly each own about 12.5% of Chelsea, meaning they are set to split the proceeds equally and generate a small profit on the deal. During their time as part-owners, Boehly served as chairman and the main face of the club’s ownership, while Walter took a more passive role and rarely attended matches.
The Boehly-Clearlake group acquired Chelsea in 2022 from Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich for almost £4.3 billion after the oligarch was sanctioned by the U.K. over his ties to the Kremlin.
Boehly was reviled by Chelsea’s supporters but took the criticism in good humor, saying it was par for the course of being the team’s chairman. Shortly after buying the club, he told a business conference he had no idea what made a good soccer player, but that “Chelsea is probably the biggest brand that one can own in sports worldwide.”
For the last couple of years, Boehly and Clearlake have held on-and-off-again sale talks amid rising tensions within the ownership group. Clearlake’s greater control of the London-based team now paves the way for a decision on the hefty investment of either building a new stadium or redeveloping Stamford Bridge.
For Walter, the deal comes at an opportune time. Federal regulators are probing the businessman’s insurance empire and he has been refinancing assets.
Authorities are examining loans that insurance companies controlled by Walter made that ultimately helped fund his other business interests. They are seeking to determine whether there was any fraud around the transactions. Those insurance companies have said they are now working to eliminate most of that lending.
Walter’s conglomerate, TWG Global, has said there was no fraud at either his Wall Street firm Guggenheim Partners or at his insurers.
Last month Walter agreed to sell his majority stake in the Los Angeles Lakers, in a deal that values the basketball team at $12.5 billion. That agreement comes only a year after Walter acquired the stake.
Ahead of the Chelsea deal, a spokesperson for Walter had said the billionaire didn’t initiate the transaction, which had been in the works for some time.
Boehly and Walter have invested alongside one another for more than a decade, having worked together at Guggenheim until 2015. In 2012, they were in a bidding group that bought the Los Angeles Dodgers for $2.15 billion, then the highest price paid for a sports team.
The deal was paid in large part by funding from insurance companies they owned with Guggenheim, causing controversy but also igniting a wave of interest from private-equity firms to tap in to sports cash flows.
Evercore was lead financial adviser on the transaction. The Raine Group, BDT&MSD Partners, and BofA Securities served as financial advisers to Clearlake. Goldman Sachs is serving as financial adviser to the sellers.