MANCHESTER – It is the last day for serious bidders to step forward in the race to buy Manchester United.
After months of speculation and rising stock prices, First offers have to be submitted on Friday to the commercial bank Raine Group, which is handling the sale of one of the most famous football teams in the world.
At the end of the day, the American-owned Glazer family will have an idea of how much they can make from the racquet they bought for about $1.4 billion in 2005.
The asking price is now estimated at up to $6 billion, with reported interest from Saudi Arabia seeing its value soar as the bid deadline nears.
While Friday is described as a soft deadline, Raine and the Glazers will have a clearer picture of potential buyers before moving on to the next phase of the process.
So far only the British billionaire Jim Ratcliffe publicly confirmed his intention to bid for the club he has supported since childhood. But a move from Qatar is expected, along with reported interest from Saudi Arabia. There are also rumors that Elon Musk could be on a list of potential buyers from the United States.
Ratcliffe, the owner of petrochemicals giant INEOS, announced its intention to make an offer last month and remains the first and only contender to go public. It’s a change of strategy from last year when he made a last-minute offer for Chelsea but was disregarded because he missed the deadline set by Raine, who also handled that sale.
Ratcliffe, who currently owns French club Nice, said last year he was not interested in another offer for a Premier League club after missing out on Chelsea and little encouragement from the Glazers for United. However, given his longstanding support of the club, he would be a popular choice among supporters.
Both Qatar and Saudi Arabia are potential bidders through their sovereign wealth funds. And both already own teams – the Qataris manage French club Paris Saint-Germain while the Saudis manage English side Newcastle.
Qatar successfully hosted the World Cup last year and there is speculation that Saudi Arabia will bid to host the 2030 tournament.
Several Americans offered to buy Chelsea last year, with Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital eventually paying $3 billion for the London club. Competing offers came from Chicago Cubs owners the Ricketts family, Boston Celtics part owner Steve Pagliuca and New York Jets owner Woody Johnson.
No American bids have been released for United unless you’re looking at a Musk post on Twitter.
The CEO of Tesla, Twitter and SpaceX wrote last August: “I’m buy Manchester United ur welcome”. And though he then pointed out that it was a “long-time joke on Twitter,” the rumors of an offer haven’t gone away.
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