LIV Golf is preparing for a potential US bankruptcy filing after Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund pulled its backing from the breakaway league, according to Bloomberg reporting. If no new money materializes before the current season wraps in late August, the league is set to dissolve.
The PIF’s exit is the decisive blow. Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund had been the financial spine of LIV Golf since the league launched as a direct rival to the PGA Tour, bankrolling player contracts and a global tournament schedule that no conventional sports backer had been willing to fund. The fund is believed to have supported the league to the tune of up to $8 billion, with little left to show for it. Without a comparable replacement, there is no obvious path to keeping the lights on past August.
LIV Golf management and advisers are running two tracks at once: an active search for new investors and emergency funding options, and a parallel bankruptcy contingency that is not waiting for the fundraising effort to fail before it gets built out.
Reporting earlier this week suggested that the league was seeking up to $250 million in near term funding as means of keeping operations afloat. An alternative track also exists that would see the league raise $150 million, while securing up to $100 million from team sales and a media rights deal.
However, no replacement investor has emerged. The window to find one is closing alongside the calendar.
A late-August collapse is not a remote scenario being stress-tested in a boardroom. It is, by all indications, a genuine possibility being planned for in real time.
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