Tag: TKO Group Holdings

TKO Group Holdings had no involvement in Vince McMahon’s recent selloff of company stock.

It was revealed earlier this week that McMahon was selling approximately 25 percent of his stock in TKO, which is the parent company of WWE and the UFC. McMahon is expected to receive more than $400 million from the sale. He will still own approximately 8.3 percent of the company following this stock sale.

While appearing at a conference presented by investment banking company Morgan Stanley on Wednesday, Endeavor and TKO executive Mark Shapiro confirmed that TKO “did not participate in the recent sale” of McMahon’s stock.

Shapiro is the president and chief operating officer of TKO. He stated that TKO is not in conversations with McMahon and does not know his motives for the stock sale.

“We don’t know his motives, his plans or his timeline,” Shapiro said. “He doesn’t work for the company, doesn’t come into the office and he’s not coming back to the company. And that’s where we sit.”

McMahon resigned from WWE and TKO this January in the wake of the lawsuit that was filed against him by former WWE employee Janel Grant. McMahon, WWE, and John Laurinaitis are named as defendants in the lawsuit. McMahon is accused of physical and emotional abuse, sexual assault, and sex trafficking.

TKO was formed last September after Endeavor’s acquisition of WWE became official. McMahon was executive chairman of TKO prior to his resignation.

McMahon also sold off some of his TKO stock last November. At the time, he sold approximately 30 percent of the stock that he owned.

Former TKO Group Holdings executive chairman Vince McMahon is selling roughly 25 percent of his remaining stock in the company. 

According to an SEC filing from Monday, McMahon is selling 5.35 million shares of TKO stock in a transaction being handled by Morgan Stanley Smith Barney. 

McMahon is expected to pocket more than $400 million from the sale. TKO stock closed on Monday at $81.67 a share. 

While the sale represents approximately 25 percent of the stock McMahon still owns in TKO, Dave Meltzer reports in Monday’s Daily Update that McMahon will still own roughly 8.3 percent of the company. Meltzer writes:

Vince McMahon today sold 5,350,000 shares of WWE stock, which is about 6.5 percent of the company, for $411.95 million. With the sale he now owns 8.3 percent of the company.

The 5.35 million shares represent approximately 6.5 percent of TKO Group Holdings shares. 

This latest transaction is the second major stock sale that McMahon has made over the last five months, as the disgraced former executive sold an additional 8.4 million shares worth roughly $700 million last November. 

McMahon resigned as executive chairman of TKO in January after being accused of sex trafficking and sexual assault in a lawsuit filed by a former WWE employee. 

New details regarding Vince McMahon’s resignation from TKO Group Holdings were revealed today in an article by The Hollywood Reporter. 

The report cites multiple sources stating the graphic details in Janel Grant’s lawsuit against WWE, McMahon, and John Laurinaitis took top TKO executives by surprise. It also notes that Mark Shapiro and Ari Emanuel called McMahon and requested he resign the day after the lawsuit was filed. 

The Hollywood Reporter’s Alex Weprin wrote:

By the time the Royal Rumble began, McMahon was gone from TKO, seemingly for good, as (TKO) sought to distance itself from McMahon’s alleged past transgressions.

Those concerns culminated the evening of Jan. 26, when Emanuel and TKO president and COO Mark Shapiro called McMahon and told him it would be in the best interest of the company for him to resign. He agreed, and submitted his resignation.

Slim Jim pulling their sponsorship from the Royal Rumble in the wake of Grant’s lawsuit was said to be a tipping point for TKO. 

TKO also reached out to WWE’s broadcast partners following news of the lawsuit. 

Sources say that TKO executives reached out to all of the company’s rights partners after the news broke, well aware of the need to keep them in the loop on what was happening. 

One source noted to the Hollywood Reporter that had Grant’s lawsuit been filed earlier, the $5 billion deal with Netflix may have been put into jeopardy. 

Multiple sources stated that the graphic details included in the lawsuit took TKO executives and WWE talent by surprise. 

The report continues:

According to multiple sources, the lawsuit and the graphic details included in it took senior leadership at TKO and company talent by surprise.

How Vince McMahon Got TKO'd https://t.co/sSJf0n6AkM

— The Hollywood Reporter (@THR) February 7, 2024

In addition to being asked to resign from the company, McMahon is also the focus of a federal investigation into allegations of sexual abuse and sex trafficking. Investigators are said to have met with several women in recent months who have also accused McMahon of sexual misconduct. 

WSJ’s report reads:

The other women named in the grand jury subpoena include a WWE contractor whom McMahon allegedly sent unsolicited nude photos and sexually harassed; a former WWE wrestler who said McMahon coerced her into giving him oral sex; former WWE referee Rita Chatterton, who publicly accused McMahon of raping her; a spa manager who said McMahon assaulted her at a Southern California resort; and a former WWE employee who alleged the head of talent relations at the company at the time, John Laurinaitis, demoted her after she broke off an affair with him.”

McMahon’s resignation from WWE was also the feature story in last week’s edition of The Wrestling Observer Newsletter. 

Our own Dave Meltzer wrote:

McMahon, 78, the most important figure in the history of pro wrestling and its greatest promoter, is likely to have his lasting memory, like Harvey Weinstein, as a loathsome sexual predator as opposed to the architect of a multi-billion dollar business.

Subscribers can click here to read this week’s issue.

TKO Group Holdings has confirmed Vince McMahon’s resignation. 

The company submitted an SEC filing on Monday officially recognizing that McMahon is no longer with the company. 

TKO’s filing reads:

On January 26, 2024, Vincent K. McMahon notified the board of directors (the “Board”) of TKO Group Holdings, Inc. (“TKO”) of his resignation from his positions as Executive Chair and a member of the Board, and any other positions, employment or otherwise, he has at TKO and its subsidiaries, in each case, with immediate effect as of January 26, 2024.

McMahon’s resignation came one day after former WWE employee Janel Grant filed a lawsuit against him, WWE, and John Laurinaitis. The suit accuses McMahon of physical and emotional abuse, sexual assault, and sex trafficking. McMahon later released a statement denying the allegations. He issued a further statement on Friday announcing he was resigning. 

McMahon’s statement from January 26 reads:

I stand by my prior statement that Ms. Grant’s lawsuit is replete with lies, obscene made-up instances that never occurred, and is a vindictive distortion of the truth. I intend to vigorously defend myself against these baseless accusations, and look forward to clearing my name.

However, out of respect for the WWE Universe, the extraordinary TKO business and its board members and shareholders, partners and constituents, and all of the employees and Superstars who helped make WWE into the global leader it is today, I have decided to resign from my executive chairmanship and the TKO board of directors, effectively immediately.

Our own Dave Meltzer wrote about Vince McMahon and Paul “Triple H” Levesque’s handling of the situation at the Royal Rumble press conference in Sunday’s Daily Update. 

Meltzer wrote:

Vince isn’t coming back, but we do have to look at the top of TKO, and that’s not Levesque or even Nick Khan, but it is Ari Emanuel who made the decision to keep him in the company after so much had already come out and those on the Board who did a investigation and never interviewed Janel Grant, who was the person whose story ultimately started the ball rolling to uncover multiple payoffs. I don’t think Levesque was hung out to dry on purpose, nor is this a defense of him, but once they decided to do the press conference, he needed to be prepped on what to say and they failed him badly. 

In the wake of the horrifying allegations made against him by Janel Grant, Vince McMahon is gone from WWE.

WWE president Nick Khan sent an email to staff on Friday night informing them that McMahon has resigned from his position as TKO Group Holdings executive chairman. Khan stated that McMahon will no longer have a role with either TKO or WWE.

Khan’s email can be read below:

I wanted to inform you that Vince McMahon has tendered his resignation from his positions as TKO Executive Chairman and on the TKO Board of Directors. He will no longer have a role with TKO Group Holdings or WWE.

McMahon’s resignation comes one day after Grant filed a lawsuit accusing him of physical and emotional abuse, sexual assault, and sex trafficking. TKO called the allegations “horrific” and said they would be addressing the matter internally.

Following his resignation, McMahon issued a statement maintaining that he will vigorously defend himself against what he calls “baseless” allegations:

I stand by my prior statement that Ms. Grant’s lawsuit is replete with lies, obscene made-up instances that never occurred, and is a vindictive distortion of the truth. I intend to vigorously defend myself against these baseless accusations, and look forward to clearing my name.

However, out of respect for the WWE Universe, the extraordinary TKO business and its board members and shareholders, partners and constituents, and all of the employees and Superstars who helped make WWE into the global leader it is today, I have decided to resign from my executive chairmanship and the TKO board of directors, effectively immediately.

Slim Jim announced on Friday that it was pausing its sponsorships with WWE due to the allegations against McMahon.

Grant is a former WWE employee. Her lawsuit names McMahon, WWE, and John Laurinaitis as defendants.

McMahon previously retired from WWE in July 2022 amid a hush-money scandal that began when the WWE board of directors learned of his settlement with Grant. But McMahon remained WWE’s majority shareholder at the time and forced himself back into power in January 2023. That won’t be an option this time after WWE was acquired by Endeavor last September.