Photo by Alessandro Bremec/NurPhoto via Getty Images
Photo by Alessandro Bremec/NurPhoto via Getty Images
Gerry Cardinale, one of the most significant shareholders in Liverpool ownership group Fenway Sports Group, is on the verge of a business acquisition for the ages.
Cardinale is the founder of private equity firm RedBird Capital, who manage around £10bn of assets globally. He also sits on the board of Paramount Skydance, whose merger Cardinale oversaw in the summer of 2024.
More recently, Cardinale was put in charge of Paramount Skydance’s attempts to take over Warner Bros – and it appears that he has been successful, with the company agreeing to buy the iconic studio for £82bn after fending off a rival bid from Netflix.
But what has any of this got to do with Liverpool?
TalkingPoints creative featuring FSG and Liverpool chairman Tom Werner
Tom Werner TalkingPoints creative Credit: Winslow Townson/Getty Images
Well, Cardinale – who also owns AC Milan through RedBird – has spoken in somewhat esoteric terms about the value he sees in Liverpool’s intellectual property (IP). In layman’s terms, that’s the rights to sell products and services using Liverpool’s trademarks and copyrights. It’s also the reason that, despite failing to be consistently profitable, the club is valued at around £4-6bn, depending on who you ask.
Simply, the new wave of American investors in the Premier League’s biggest and best clubs evangelise about how their IP is poorly monetised. It’s a way of talking about football that is completely alien for bedrock fans on the terraces at Anfield, but it’s the way these private equity types think.
Liverpool’s commercial income in 2024-25 was about £315m. Only Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and the two Manchester clubs earned more. The majority of that revenue comes from sponsorship and retail – and the majority of it comes from well, well beyond L4.
Their revenue in this category dwarfs nearly everyone else’s in the Premier League. But when it comes to broadcast income, it’s a different story. Broadly speaking, TV money is relatively meritocratic. The higher up the table you finish, the more cash you get from the Premier League’s central pot. Sure, teams who are broadcast the most get a little more money proportionately, but it doesn’t significantly move the dial.
AC Milan and Liverpool owner via FSG Gerry Cardinale looks on before the Trofeo Berlusconi match between AC Milan and Monza on August 13, 2024 in Milan, Italy.
Photo by AC Milan/AC Milan via Getty Images
Despite banking £175m in prize money last season, Liverpool aren’t particularly happy with that setup. The way they see it, they are – win or lose – one of the world’s biggest football brands. And for that reason, FSG think they deserve a bigger slice of the broadcast pie.
One method the owners have proposed in the past is that Liverpool should be allowed to sell a portion of their own rights – i.e., offer fans a one-off streaming pass to watch Arne Slot’s side play live. Going direct to the consumer (D2C) would be much, much more lucrative than going through the Premier League middle man. In both Project Big Picture and the European Super League, there was a provision for this.
Increasingly, Liverpool see themselves as a media company. And with the news that the Premier League is launching a D2C service in Singapore with a view to a worldwide rollout at some point, the Reds will smell an opportunity to push further in this direction.
FSG bosses John Henry and Tom Werner converse
Photo by Billie Weiss/Boston Red Sox/Getty Images
Cardinale is one of the biggest players in the monetisation of IP and media. Now, he can count Warner Bros as under his sphere of influence too. According to University of Liverpool football finance lecturer Kieran Maguire, that kind of expertise will be invaluable if and when Liverpool lean even more heavily into their capacity to be a media company.
If Liverpool go down the route of selling a portion of their rights direct to the consumer – and that was part of Project Big Picture and the European Super League – they will need a media company they can go through,” the Price of Football author told Rousing The Kop in an exclusive conversation.
“Having an organisation like RedBird there who is able to advise Liverpool would be invaluable. I think they would absolutely be using the expertise of Gerry Cardinale in that situation. It would definitely go ahead.”