Abramovich allowed to sell Chelsea to Todd Boehly
The UK government has finally granted permission for sanctioned Roman Abramovich to sell to Todd Boehly, with a $5.3 billion transfer budget on the way - plus $53 million for Bruce Buck and Marina Granovskaia.
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Sanctioned Abramovich allowed to sell Chelsea to Todd Boehly
The British government approved Todd Boehly's $5.3 billion purchase of Chelsea football club from sanctioned Russian owner Roman Abramovich on Wednesday.
Nadine Dorries, Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media, and Sport, said she had issued a license approving the deal hours after it was approved by the Premier League on Tuesday evening.
"We are satisfied the proceeds of the sale will not benefit Roman Abramovich or other sanctioned individuals," Dorries said in a tweet.
"Given the sanctions, we placed on those linked to (Vladimir) Putin and the bloody invasion of Ukraine, the long-term future of the club can only be secured under a new owner," she added.
It is worth mentioning that a consortium led by Boehly, a co-owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers, agreed to buy the club from Abramovich earlier this month in a record deal.
The Russian listed Chelsea for sale in early March, just before Britain sanctioned him.
Seven billionaires have been sanctioned by the UK in response to the war in Ukraine.
The takeover has taken a long time to complete due to government concerns about Abramovich's ability to profit from the sale.
Earlier this month, the deal appeared to be on the verge of failing due to concerns that the proceeds would not go to "good causes" as promised by the outgoing owner.
The total value of the transaction breaks the previous record for the sale of a sports team, which was $2.4 billion for the New York Mets baseball team in 2020.
Since Abramovich was sanctioned, Chelsea has been forced to operate under a special license.
Chelsea could not conduct any transfer business with existing players or external targets due to the asset freeze imposed on them.
The Blues can now resume normal operations, and there will be no time to waste in reorganizing the playing roster.
Who is Todd Boehly?
Todd Boehly moved on to venture capitalists JH Whitney & Co, and then to Guggenheim Partners in 2001, where he launched a credit-management business for the financial services behemoth. His contributions included advising clients to avoid investing in several companies where major fraud was later exposed, including the energy company Enron.
Boehly, 46, fulfilled a long-held ambition by starting his own business in 2015. Under the banner of his holding company Eldridge Industries, He began by acquiring several assets from Guggenheim, including the film industry bible The Hollywood Reporter, the TV company Dick Clark Productions, three years after its $298 million purchase, and Security Benefit.
Eldridge Industries now has assets worth about $35 billion and stakes in dozens of businesses.
Its assorted portfolio includes the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team, the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team, the song catalogs of Bruce Springsteen and The Killers, as well as numerous technology and property interests. Cain International, which is based in London and is led by Jonathan Goldstein, another member of the Chelsea bid, is among the latter. Chelsea fans Daniel Finkelstein, a journalist, PR executive Barbara Charone, and ex-Chancellor George Osborne are also on Boehly's team.
No way people want us to sell Gilmour.....it goes against everything Abramovich was building
— Boehly Era (@ToddBoehlyEra) May 25, 2022
Looking at the boy you can see pure talent in there ,no way people are telling us about his height !!!
He bossed Liverpool on his debut ... Liverpool ff
Among his countrymen, however, Boehly is perhaps best known for his work with the Los Angeles Dodgers. The franchise's World Series victory in 2020 was its first in 22 years under Guggenheim's management and with Boehly as a partner. The television deal he negotiated was critical to investing in the roster.
