Luxembourg-Spanish investor takes majority in Boavista football unit
The Luxembourgish-Spanish entrepreneur has confirmed the purchase of a 50.78% stake in Boavista SAD.
Gérard Lopez, a Luxembourgish-Spanish entrepreneur and investor, has confirmed his completion of the acquisition of a majority of the shares of Boavista FC, Futebol SAD, the sports management unit of Boavista, a top-flight football club in Portugal, according to documents released via the country’s securities market regulator, the CMVM.
Lopez, who now controls the Boavista SAD through his Jogo Bonito group, in which he has a 88% stake, on July 28 bought 1,279,596 shares, equivalent to a 36.56% stake in the SAD, from the club itself, and a further 497,704 (14.22%) from BFC Investimentos, making a total stake of 50.78%, according to Thursday’s statement.
Boavista now has a minority in the sports management unit that it itself set up, with 350,000 class A shares, or 10% of the total share capital. The shares sold to Gérard Lopez automatically become class B shares.
Should the club in future repurchase any of the shares it sold to Lopez, they are automatically reconverted into class A shares – which have a number of privileges, under the club’s statutes and under an agreement signed with Lopez.
Lopez also owns Bordeaux, one of France’s leading football clubs.
His move to increase his stake in the Boavista SAD, which was flagged to the CMVM in August, prompted it to rule at the end of that month that he must go ahead with a compulsory takeover bid for all shares in the unit.
Boavista club members had already unanimously Lopez’s stake in the SAD, at a general meeting held on 10 October last year.
The club’s first team are currently eighth in the Liga Bwin, the top flight, with 10 points from eight games. They have won the league only once – in the 2000/1 season – since the club was founded in 1903.
