The golf league apparently has an investor.
LIV Golf is bankrupt but there is some sort of plan that will allow the entity to emerge from Chapter 11 protection. LIV Golf is “restructuring” and will be a smaller entity if it emerges from bankruptcy. LIV Golf claims it has an investor, London, England-based BC Partners Advisors, interested in its product. LIV Golf and BC Partners have a player-first model in mind with the company majority owned by the players. “The next phase of LIV Golf will be built around a sustainable business model and deeper alignment between players and the league, with team golf at its core,” LIV’s CEO Scott O’Neil said. “Players will have the opportunity to share directly in the value they help create, while teams will be positioned to grow into enduring global sports businesses.”
The Public Investment Fund of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia decided last April to pull the plug on funding LIV Golf at the end of the 2026 season. The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey authorized the league to withdraw $14 million in cash from debtor-in-possession financing. That will allow LIV Golf to run its day-to-day business for now and pay some people. In sports, financial insolvency generally signals doom for a league. Two American Basketball Leagues came and went, a men’s league that started in 1961 and ended on December 31st, 1962 and a women’s league which started in 1996 and shut down in December 1998. A number of football leagues ranging from the United States Football League to the Alliance of American Football folded. The present-day United Football League partially owes its existence to the second XFL emerging from bankruptcy. There is a long road ahead for LIV Golf with another bankruptcy court appearance scheduled for October 7th.
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