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The American owners of the English soccer club Liverpool, Fenway Sports Group, announced this Friday the sale of a minority portion of their shares to a group of investors which includes the founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos.
The 62-year-old American billionaire is listed in the 1892 Holdings consortium, which refers to the year of Liverpool FC's founding and includes funds also coming from businessman Amit Bhatia, the Mittal family, and the couple Elaine and Eduardo Saverin, the latter a co-founder of Facebook, according to the statement.
The announcement does not provide details on the amount of the transaction nor the level of ownership that group will hold.
According to several media outlets, this stake will be one-third of the total.
Jeff Bezos, who possesses the fourth largest fortune in the world, estimated at 256 billion dollars, will not in principle be part of Liverpool FC's expanded Board of Directors.
Amit Bhatia is expected to be on it as vice president.
Bryan Baum, founder of the venture capital firm K5 Sports, through which the Amazon boss invests, and Elaine Saverin will indeed become members of the Board of Directors.
"Liverpool has always been built with an eye beyond a single season, making decisions in the best long-term interest of the club," declared Mike Gordon, president of Fenway Sports Group (FSG).
The entity specified that it retains "majority ownership and operational control" of Liverpool.
FSG bought the English club for 300 million dollars in 2010 and had sold a 3% minority stake to the American sports investment firm Dynasty Equity three years ago.
The deal with 1892 Holdings comes on the eve of the new season, in which Liverpool has Spaniard Andoni Iraola as the new manager, replacing the Dutchman Arne Slot.
The club is still looking to reinforce itself for the new campaign, in which it will no longer feature Egyptian Mohamed Salah, an icon of its last decade who has left the Reds squad.
[Publicidad]