With his business empire under scrutiny from federal investigators, Mark Walter was on the hunt for cash when, out of nowhere, he was about to be offered an enormous pile of money. The chief executive of Guggenheim Partners needed liquidity to keep his insurance companies afloat, people familiar with the matter said.
Joshua Kushner, the chief executive of Thrive Capital, was reaching out with a potentially gigantic offer. All he wanted to know was, would Walter be willing to sell the Los Angeles Lakers?
Over the following days, they ironed out one of the most sudden and shocking deals in sports. By Wednesday, Kushner and former Disney chief executive Bob Iger had agreed to buy a controlling stake in the storied franchise at a $12.5 billion valuation, the highest price ever paid for any sports team.
But the cost wasn't the only reason the deal was so astonishing. Walter, who also counts the Los Angeles Dodgers in his sprawling portfolio, had only purchased the Lakers a year earlier when they were valued at a then-record $10 billion. And before his deal to sell the Lakers came together unusually fast, there was no indication that one of the most iconic brands in sports was up for sale.
That's because it wasn't -- at least not until Kushner dangled a historic sum of money. Beyond the Lakers, Walter has also expressed an interest in selling his minority stake in the English Premier League club Chelsea, a person familiar with the matter said.
All of this is unfolding against the backdrop of a looming threat to Walter's empire. The U.S. Attorney's Office in Manhattan and the Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating how billions in loans extended to companies tied to Walter or his conglomerate, TWG Global, wound up on the books of his insurance companies after passing through a third entity. In a previous statement, a TWG spokesperson said the company was "confident these matters will be resolved favorably."
Walter, 66 years old, built his fortune as one of the founders of bond manager and investment bank Guggenheim Partners in 1999. He branched into insurance, spotting how annuity savers' years of steady premiums could be a good match for multigenerational investments in sports, fast food and technology.
While his holdings grew to include high-profile sports franchises, Walter generally keeps a low profile, preferring time with his wife and daughter to glitzy events.
Before the recent disclosures by his insurance companies, Walter had been seen as among the most successful financiers of his era. But the current situation has left Walter scrambling for cash, because the state regulator in Delaware overseeing his insurance companies is requiring that they dispose of or restructure almost all of those Walter-related investments by the end of 2026. That made the timing of Kushner's offer incredibly fortuitous.
Selling the Lakers freed up other assets and collateral that Walter had pledged to finance the team purchase last year, a person familiar with the matter said -- which might help the insurance remediation move more quickly. The surprise offer wasn't part of the initial plan to become compliant with regulators, another person said, and the group continues to look for other fundraising options.
"Owning the Los Angeles Lakers has been one of the great honors of my life," Walter said in a statement announcing the deal. "It has been an extraordinary investment, but what I will carry with me is the community, the fans, and a city that treats this team as family."
Since 1979, the Lakers had been owned by the Buss family, which oversaw an era in which the team racked up championships and put all-time legends in purple and gold. When Walter took over, the NBA said that Jeanie Buss, the daughter of the late Jerry Buss, would stay on as the team's controlling governor for at least five years -- an unusual condition when a team changes hands.
Nonetheless, it added another jewel to Walter's sports empire. In addition to the Dodgers, his assets include the WNBA's Los Angeles Sparks and the Professional Women's Hockey League.
But the Lakers would soon become part of the solution to Walter's cash crunch.
Kushner, the brother of President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, had his sights set on an NBA team. Thrive Eternal, a holding company with a focus on sports assets, struck its first deal earlier for a stake in Major League Baseball's San Francisco Giants. Thrive had also agreed to buy into a new commercial enterprise launched by FIFA until the plan was aborted following widespread backlash in global soccer.
Kushner originally had his eye on the NBA's potential expansion into Las Vegas, people familiar with the matter said. But he preferred Los Angeles to the Nevada desert and began his pitch to Walter's camp over the weekend.
Just a few dizzying days later, they had struck the richest team sale in sports history.