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LIV Golf Shuts Down After Failing to Secure New Investors
Confirmed
In Short: LIV Golf, the controversial golf league backed by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF), announced it is shutting down after failing to secure new investors.
LIV Golf, the controversial golf league backed by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF), announced it is shutting down after failing to secure new investors.
The league, which had hoped to continue under new investors in a new form dubbed LIV 2.0, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the United States in September after Saudi Arabia withdrew its multibillion-dollar funding.
LIV Golf’s lawyer, Matt Williams, said on Thursday that they are 'not currently proceeding' with LIV 2.0 and are 'toggling to a value-maximising wind-down of their business.'
LIV Golf paid $15.6 million to retain seven of its executives, including $6.375 million to CEO Scott O'Neil, in the months between the PIF and LIV filing for bankruptcy.
The PGA Tour banned players who joined LIV Golf from its own competitions, causing a significant rift among golf’s leading male professionals.
LIV Golf had promised to be 'golf, but louder' with shorter rounds, limited competitor fields, and lots of money to make the sport more attractive to new spectators.
LIV Golf’s bankruptcy filing in September included $49.6 million in debtor-in-possession financing from Saudi Arabia’s PIF to help keep the business operating during the restructuring.
What this adds
The league's shutdown marks the end of a tumultuous period for the sport, during which some of the best-known golfers controversially broke away from the US-based PGA Tour.
The shutdown of LIV Golf is a significant setback for the Saudi Arabia-backed venture that had aimed to reshape men’s professional golf entirely.
Background
The controversial golf league backed by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund is shutting down after failing to secure new investors.
What's confirmed
- Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund announced earlier this year that it would pull all its funding for the league after the 2026 season, ending its investment after sinking more than $5 billion into LIV Golf since its launch.
What's still developing
- Now in the early stages of its crucial second season, with US$2 billion (£1.65 billion) having been invested, LIV Golf is taking a real swing at the golfing establishment.
- The first major tournament of 2023 in men’s professional golf could be a particularly tense affair.
- Approximately 90 players will compete for that jacket after a tumultuous 12 months for the sport, during which some of the best-known golfers have controversially broken away from the US-based PGA Tour, the biggest and most powerful organiser of professional golf events.
- Our recent research suggests that LIV Golf was constructed not simply to add an extra layer to the men’s professional game or create a breakaway league.
- And while LIV Golf was initially labelled “ dead in the water ” by Northern Ireland’s four-time major champion Rory McIlroy in early 2022, not everyone agreed.
- LIV Golf responded by saying the PGA Tour was being “vindictive” and divisive.
- In fact, it appears designed to reshape men’s professional golf entirely.
- But after four years, LIV Golf has announced that it will liquidate.
- But it seemed that the breakaway event had earned a lifeline when BC Partners Credit pledged a $300 million investment to pivot to a more financially sustainable “LIV 2.0.” So why are the organisers of LIV Golf pulling the plug?
- “In light of the current circumstances, we believe shifting toward an orderly wind-down is the most responsible path forward for the League at this time,” Gene Davis and Jon Zinman of LIV Golf board’s special committee said in a press release late on Thursday.
- LIV Golf sent shockwaves through the sport when it burst onto the scene in June 2022 with a mix of star power and past-their-prime veterans who signed lucrative contracts to appear in tournaments with guaranteed paydays.
- As originally reported by Sujeet Indap, the Financial Times’ Wall Street Editor who has been working on the case since LIV filed for a Chapter 11 bankruptcy following the decision by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund to withdraw its financial support, the league will now seek a liquidation of its remaining assets as it begins to wind down.