Houston Running Back Arian Foster Is Going Public at the Perfect Time

Arian Foster, a running back for the Houston Texans, is a rarity in the NFL. He hustled his way to stardom through the practice squad after being spurned by every team in the draft, becoming one of the highest-paid athletes in the country while doing so. Foster seems rare in another way, as well. Now that he’s reached the top, he’s placing a multimillion dollar bet that he’s overvalued by the public. He’s probably right.

On Thursday the New York Times reported that Foster would be the first athlete to go public through a new company called Fantex Holdings. Fantex has established a market in which people can purchase and trade shares of athletes’ future earnings, in a sort of stock market for jocks. The company has persuaded regulators that this counts as investing, not gambling.