Members of the billionaire Koch family will buy a minority stake in BSE Global, the holding company which owns the Brooklyn Nets, New York Liberty and the Barclays Center.
Julia Koch and her three children have agreed to invest an undisclosed amount in the group, according to a statement Wednesday. They will acquire a 15% holding in a deal valuing BSE Global at about $6 billion, a person familiar with the matter said, asking not to be identified because the information is private.
The Nets’ majority owner is Alibaba Group Holding co-founder Joseph Tsai, who will retain control of the teams, according to the statement. Bloomberg first reported Koch family members were in talks to acquire a stake in BSE Global.
The deal marks the highest valuation for an NBA franchise to date. Late last year, Mark Cuban sold a majority stake in the Dallas Mavericks to Las Vegas Sands’s Adelson family, valuing the team at $3.5 billion. Cuban bought the franchise from H. Ross Perot Jr. in 2000 for about $285 million.
The Kochs have an estimated fortune of $140 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Charles Koch, the firm’s chairman, is the world’s 22nd-richest person with a net worth of about $66 billion. Julia is the widow of his brother David, who died in 2019.
While stakes in NBA teams have often changed hands with little fanfare, the rising wealth of the ultra-rich and the valuations of franchises has driven a surge in interest in such deals. Mat Ishbia, the billionaire chief executive officer of United Wholesale Mortgage, agreed in late 2022 to buy the NBA’s Phoenix Suns and WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury in a record deal that valued the teams at $4 billion.
A stake in the Golden State Warriors, the NBA’s most successful team over the past decade, is also up for sale with a potential valuation of $7 billion, Bloomberg News has reported.
Tsai bought 49% of the Nets in 2017 from Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov. He purchased the remaining stake along with the Barclays Center arena in 2019 in what ultimately ended up as a $3.5 billion deal including debt.
Giles Turner, Bloomberg , 2024-06-21 16:03:03
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