Qatari investors to make offer to buy Man Utd ‘this week’ amid fresh ‘interest’ from Elon Musk
Qatari investors will reportedly make an offer to buy Man Utd ‘this week’ but there is understood to be growing competition from rivals.
The Glazer family announced last November that they would be evaluating the possibilities of a sale and this process is being overseen by American merchant bankers Raine.
Bloomberg are reporting that a Qatari consortium are preparing to make a bid to purchase the club. This is said to be being assisted by officials at the Qatar Investment Authority (the country’s sovereign wealth fund).
Sources aware of the discussions told the PA news agency last week that the sovereign wealth fund was only looking to take a minority stake in either United or another Premier League club, and that it was far from a done deal.
That source’s understanding was that Qatar Sports Investments would then manage any stake bought by the QIA, but QSI sources deny any link to United and insist QSI is an entirely separate entity to the QIA.
The source who referenced the QIA’s interest in buying a minority stake said a full takeover of United by anyone connected to Qatar was, to their knowledge, out of the question.
The QIA has assets estimated to be worth 450 billion US dollars, as it looks to use the country’s natural gas wealth to diversify the country’s economy.
The chief executive of the QIA, Mansoor Al Mahmoud, told Bloomberg in January: “Football, the clubs and the sport is becoming very commercialised in a way, especially now fans are looking into this as an experience, so they would like to go and experience and entertain themselves.
“At the same time digitalisation is becoming very important for this, so the business model of these institutions are becoming very commercialised and very investment-friendly.
“Sovereign wealth funds are becoming investors in some of the clubs and you will not be surprised if we invest in this (area) but again we go into a very fundamental process and making sure if we invest this is very commercially driven for our future generations.”
On Monday afternoon, it was reported that Elon Musk – the second richest person in the world according to Forbes – is ‘believed to be interested in making a £4.5bn move to buy Man Utd’.
The billionaire is said to be ‘monitoring the situation closely’ as he ‘likes’ Man Utd. The report adds:
‘While associates of the Twitter, Tesla and SpaceX supremo will not comment on any possible interest, sources close to the deal are aware of his attention.
‘Dozens, it is understood, have expressed an interest and signed confidentiality agreements allowing them to gain access to the “data room”.’
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