During the past decade or so, the world’s most valuable sports brands have been using their wealth and their connections with other great sports assets to expand their sports holdings into everything from media to real estate to other sports teams and stadium operations in historic fashion.
It’s all about packing with scale, asset diversification, and tax breaks (see the back of the story for a full list of the most valuable sports empires).
The ideal boss: Kroenke Sports & Entertainment, value of $ 8. 4 billion. The Stan Kroenke empire began with the acquisition of the NBA NBA and Denver NBA Nuggets Colorado Avalanche in 2000, with the Pepsi Center, the sand shared by the groups, for 400 million combined dollars. A decade later, it acquired 60% that did not have Rams of the NFL, then in Saint -Louis, now in Los Angeles, in an agreement that edits the team at $ 750 million. The 3 groups now have a value of 5. 7 billion dollars combined through the estimation of Forbes.
Jerry Jones, a big proponent of the stadium allocation in Los Angeles, has the moment of the maximum valid gaming empire, worth $6. 9 billion. His trophy, the Dallas Cowboys, which he bought with the operating rights at Texas Stadium for $150 million in 1989, is the highest valuable gaming team on the planet, valued at $5. 5 billion. But Jones also owns more than a third of The Legends, a hotel and a stadium vending business that has deals with Kroenke’s maximum gaming properties. In addition, Jones generates a revenue stream related to the Star Game: the $1. 5 billion in Cowboys, combined commodities of genuine goods, head and practice in Frisco, Texas, and is the majority owner, with John Goff, of Complexity, an Egames, an Egames organization.
This trend will continue. In 2018, the homeowners of the NFL voted to raise the long -standing ban from the League, which that they are now loose to own a pro sports team in a other town that has a NFL team. The NBA, the MLB and the NHL have already enabled one of their groups to be owned in the other leagues. The homeowners’ debt limits have also been recently stimulated, which provides them more cash to take merit of their own capital to build stadiums.
The NFL’s latest owner, David Tepper, is mobilizing his billions. He paid $2. 3 billion last year for the Carolina Panthers. This week, MLS awarded Tepper its 30th franchise in Charlotte for an expansion of up to $325 million.
The result: the bifurcation between the richest sports and everyone else will widen.
To compile our scorecard of the most valuable sports empires, we screened our database of the most valuable teams from the NFL, MLB, the NBA, the NHL and soccer for people or companies whose holdings in these teams were above $2 billion. Only those with a majority interest in at least one team were eligible. For those that made the cut, we valued their investments in their other sports properties. We excluded the Paul G. Allen Trust, which has owned the Seattle Seahawks, Portland Trail Blazers and a minority stake in the Seattle Sounders since the passing of Paul Allen a little over a year ago because the assets are essentially in a holding pattern until they are sold. Had we included the Paul G. Allen Trust it would have ranked ninth at $4.4 billion. Our empire valuations are enterprise values (equity plus net debt) of all sports-related assets. The top ten own sports assets worth a combined $56 billion.
1. Kroenke Sports & Entertainment: 8. 4 billion dollars
Properties: Los Angeles Rams, Arsenal, Denver Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche, Colorado Rapids, Colorado Mammoth, Altitude Sports
2. Jerry Jones: $ 6. 9 billion
Properties: Dallas Cowboys, Legends *, The Star, Complexity Gaming
3. Fenway Sports Group: $6.6 billion
Properties: Boston Red Sox, Liverpool, Nesn, Roush Fenway Racing, Fenway Sports Management
4. Yankee Global Enterprises: $ 6. 1 billion
Properties: New York Yankees, Legends*, Yes Network*, New York City FC*
5. Madison Square Garden Co: $5.9 billion
Properties: New York Knicks, New York Rangers
6. Glazer family: $ 5. 2 billion
Properties: Manchester United, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
7. City Football Group: $4. 8 billion
Properties: Manchester City, New York City FC, Melbourne City FC
8. Kraft family: $ 4. 5 billion
Properties: New England Patriots, New England Revolution, UFC*, Kraft Analytics Group
9. Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment: $ 3. 6 billion
Properties: Toronto Raptors, Toronto Maple Leafs, Toronto FC, Toronto Argonauts
10. Benson Family: $3.5 billion
Properties: New Orleans Saints, New Orleans Pelicans
* It has 50%