NFL team sales are likely to stall as valuations soar

The Seattle Seahawks may be the next National Football League team to sell. Beyond that, it’s anyone’s guess when another franchise will change hands.

Former Seahawks owner and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen died in 2018. Since Allen’s death, the team has been controlled by a trust run by Allen’s sister, Jody. Allen’s estate calls for the team to eventually be sold, with the proceeds going to charity. But there’s no clear timetable for a transaction to take place.

Allen’s trust has reason to wait — and it’s the same logic for why other team owners may not sell any time soon.

NFL valuations will likely keep rising in the years to come because of the league’s media rights deal, expansion and the addition of games, according to Marc Ganis, a sports consultant who advises NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and league owners. Owners risk missing big gains if they offload teams now.

“We are not even close to the top of the market for the NFL,” said Ganis. “The NFL is still in a growth phase in terms of appreciation and in terms of net revenue.” 

The average NFL team is now worth $6.49 billion, and no team is valued at less than $5.25 billion, according to CNBC’s Official 2024 NFL Team Valuations. Seven of the last 10 NFL teams to be sold outperform the S&P 500 on a percentage-gained basis since the sale.

Driven by growth in leaguewide media, sponsorship and licensing deals — which are split among all 32 teams — the average franchise had $640 million in revenue and $127 million in operating income last year, according to people familiar with the teams’ finances.

The NFL’s new media rights deal fully kicked in last year. It’s an 11-year agreement that runs through 2033 and is worth more than $110 billion — an 80% increase from the league’s previous deal. There’s also a clause that allows the league to opt out of all packages except Disney‘s at the end of the 2028-2029 season; the NFL has an out clause for Disney’s deal after 2030.

That option will give owners another chance at cashing in after the National Basketball Association nearly tripled the value of its own media rights in July. Hypothetical future bids from deep-pocketed technology companies such as Amazon, Netflix and Alphabet‘s YouTube may lead to surges in value for the NFL’s most-watched games. TV ratings continue to increase: The 2023-24 season’s ratings jumped 7% from a year earlier, ending as the second-highest rated since data was first tracked in 1995.

“The NFL is the largest and most valuable audience in the U.S. for advertisers,” said Neal Pilson, former president of CBS Sports and founder and president of Pilson Communications. “The NBA deal will be a benchmark, but it will also be ancient history by the time the NFL renews, even if it opts out. That’s still four years away. Everyone is aware of how well the NBA did. But in the end, the NFL’s rights deal will be predicated on its audience and the revenue third parties think it can generate from being a partner.”

The expected addition of an 18th regular season game in the coming years and Goodell’s interest in boosting the NFL’s popularity internationally by adding games in Spain, Germany and Brazil should also lead to increased league revenue and higher valuations, said Ganis.

“The NFL has barely scratched the surface on international revenues,” he said.

Each of the last four NFL team sales has set a new record, showcasing the rise in valuations. Billionaire businessman Terry Pegula and his wife, Kim, acquired the Buffalo Bills in 2014 for $1.4 billion after the death of Ralph Wilson, the franchise’s founding owner. That sum was topped in 2018 by hedge fund manager David Tepper’s purchase of the Carolina Panthers for $2.3 billion. The Panthers sold after the NFL fined previous owner Jerry Richardson for workplace misconduct.

Rob Walton, a member of the family that owns Walmart, led a group that bought the Denver Broncos for $4.65 billion in 2022 after the death of Pat Bowlen.

Those investments have ballooned in a few short years. Today, the Bills are worth $5.35 billion, the Panthers are valued at $5.9 billion, and the Broncos’ value has increased to $6.2 billion, according to CNBC’s 2024 Valuations.

The NFL prefers to have owners that span decades because they’ll favor long-term decision-making over short-term profits, said Ganis. Modernized estate planning to reduce taxes has led to more family handoffs from one generation to another, he said.

That has further decreased full-franchise sales. The NFL mandates every team have a written succession plan in case its owner dies. The Chicago Bears are currently owned by 101-year-old Virginia Halas McCaskey, the daughter of team founder George Halas. As planned, when McCaskey dies, the Bears ownership will be distributed among her children and controlled by her eighth-oldest child, George McCaskey, the 68-year-old who currently is the team’s chairman.

“The league’s decision-makers have enormous skin in the game,” said Ganis. “They’re not paid employees with voting rights. They’re making choices thinking generationally.”

Limited franchise turnover and soaring valuations have led Goodell to favor allowing private equity ownership for the first time. NFL owners voted last week to allow select private equity firms to buy up to a 10% stake of a team. Each fund or consortium will be able to do deals with up to six teams.

The Miami Dolphins, the Bills and the Los Angeles Chargers are among the teams that will likely explore selling minority stakes to private equity, according to people familiar with the matter. The Bills are considering selling up to 25% of the team in total.

Spokespeople for those three teams declined to comment.

The initial firms approved to invest are Ares Management, Sixth Street Partners and Arctos Partners, as well as a consortium that includes Dynasty Equity, Blackstone, Carlyle Group, CVC Capital Partners and Ludis, a platform founded by investor and former NFL running back Curtis Martin. That list is likely to grow with time, said Tracy Gallagher, head of private investments at Arta Finance, a digital wealth management platform.

“The NFL has clearly put liquidity at the forefront,” said Gallagher. “This is the first of many steps toward adding more buyer options.”

The league is treading carefully and taking baby steps with private equity ownership. The NBA, the NHL and Major League Baseball allow up to 30% ownership by private equity firms. The NFL has limited ownership to 10% with select firms and intends to take a percentage of the so-called carry — the profit that fund managers keep after hitting return thresholds for their limited partners.

“I think our league is unique in that we still have 32 individual owners,” said Robert Kraft, owner of the NFL’s New England Patriots, in a CNBC interview Aug. 28. “We have a very special culture and we wanted to be mindful that we didn’t do anything to change the substance of what makes our league so great.”

“Some of the ownership groups have real problems with the illiquidity,” he said. “They have big families and have to solve a lot of problems that are not usual. And so we thought this was a great source of capital and could be done in a way that was very functional and wouldn’t affect the [team] operation,” he added.

Kraft told CNBC the league’s hesitancy to allow more than 10% private equity ownership was about highlighting teams’ roles in their local communities over making money.

“Limiting the investment to 10% is a way to keep it under control, from our point of view,” he said.

Still, the league’s onerous restrictions may limit investment interest, even as NFL franchises have a clear upward valuation trajectory, said Gallagher.

“These are crown jewel assets, but at the end of the day, private equity managers get wealthy on carry,” said Gallagher. “If you take away a portion of that, you’re taking away incentive to buy these assets.”

Gallagher also noted other standard private equity investments have downside protection and offer board seats in case valuations plummet. The NFL doesn’t have plans to allow governance rights to private equity firms at this point.

“It will be very interesting to see what exactly funds are buying and how are they protected to deliver returns to their end investors,” said Gallagher.

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