Manchester United Said to Choose September to Start IPO Marketing Campaign
Manchester United Said to Plan Singapore IPO for September
Sonny Tumbelaka/AFP/Getty Images
Manchester United Ltd., the record 19-time English soccer champion, may start gauging investor demand next month for a $1 billion initial public offering in Singapore, three people with knowledge of the matter said.
Manchester United Ltd., the record 19-time English soccer champion, may start gauging investor demand next month for a $1 billion initial public offering in Singapore, three people with knowledge of the matter said. Photographer: Sonny Tumbelaka/AFP/Getty Images
Aug. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Jon Collins, chief executive officer of Centurion Sports, discusses Manchester United's planned $1 billion initial public offering in Singapore. He speaks from Singapore with Mark Barton on Bloomberg Television's "First Look." (Source: Bloomberg)
Manchester United Ltd., the record 19-time English soccer champion, may start gauging investor demand next month for a $1 billion initial public offering in Singapore, three people with knowledge of the matter said.
The soccer club is scheduled to hold an analyst presentation for the deal next week, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the process is private. It hired JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) and Morgan Stanley (MS) as so-called bookrunners for the IPO together with Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN), the people said.
United has been examining ways to cut its financing costs and raise money that could be used to expand its business. It also wants to acquire players that can help it fend off the challenge of clubs including Manchester City, owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, a member of Abu Dhabi’s ruling family, and Chelsea, owned by Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich.
Philip Townsend, spokesman for United had no comment. United also picked BOC International Ltd., CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets, CIMB Group Holdings Bhd. (CIMB) and DBS Group Holdings Ltd. (DBS) as co-lead arrangers for the offering, said the people.
The club’s U.S. owners, the Glazer family, bought the team in 2005 for 790 million pounds ($1.3 billion). United spends about 45 million pounds a year to service a 500 million-pound bond. The bond, which matures in 2017, replaced bank debt required for the purchase.
As much as 30 percent of the club will be sold in the IPO, which would give the club an enterprise value, or the sum of its stock and debt minus cash, of about $3.8 billion, said one of the people.
Forbes magazine estimates the team is now worth $1.8 billion, while it was third behind Real Madrid and Barcelona in Deloitte LLP’s list of the richest soccer clubs by revenue, published in February.
United picked Asia as the listing venue as more than half of its fans are based in the region. The club, which says it’s the most-supported team in the world, has a global following of more than 330 million, according to a club-sponsored survey. It has fan clubs in Asian nations including Thailand and Singapore with about 190 million followers.
To contact the reporters on this story: Joyce Koh in Singapore at jkoh38@bloomberg.net; Zijing Wu in London at zwu17@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Philip Lagerkranser at lagerkranser@bloomberg.net
Rate this Page