UFC acquires WWE: How much will it be bought for?

Endeavor, the owner of the mixed martial arts championship UFCannounced this Monday that it will buy the wrestling company WWE with the aim of forming a sports and entertainment giant valued at 21,000 million dollars (about 19,300 million euros at current exchange rates).

In a statement, Endeavor indicated that the purchase operation, expected to close in the second half of 2023, will unite the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) brands under the same umbrella in a single company, which will be baptized later and will also go public.

According to the details disclosed, the resulting company will be controlled by Endeavor (51%) and its board of directors will include Ariel Emanuel (Endeavor) as CEO, Vincent McMahon (WWE) as executive president and Mark Shapiro (Endeavor) as president and head of operations.

WWE had been looking for a buyer for months and, after a weekend of speculation, the two companies have agreed to “maximize” the value of their “media rights, enhance the monetization of sponsorships, develop new forms of content and seek other strategic purchases and mergers. ”, says the note.

Together, in fiscal 2022, the UFC and WWE had revenues of $2.4 billion and have experienced annual revenue growth of 10% per year since 2019.

Through the deal, both brands will contribute cash to the resulting company to bring it “about $150 million,” and expect their synergies to deliver cost savings of between $50 million and $100 million annually.

McMahon, who is the majority owner of WWE, retired from the executive direction of that company last year due to a scandal of million-dollar payments to several women to silence accusations of sexual misconduct for decades, but he rejoined this past January to work in the sales process.

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After the news broke, Endeavor fell more than 8% on Wall Street, where it has a capitalization of 16.8 billion and has lost 25% in the last year. For its part, WWE, which has a market value of 6,800 million and has gained 40% in the last year, was down almost 4% today.