The UFC and WWE merger became official on Tuesday morning with the official launch of TKO Group Holdings.
TKO announced a special one-time cash dividend earlier today as a result of the merger.
You can check out the official announcement below:
TKO Announces Special Cash Dividend
09/13/2023
NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)– TKO Group Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: TKO) (“TKO” or the “Company”), a premium sports and entertainment company, today announced that it has declared a special cash dividend pursuant to the terms of the transaction agreement between UFC and WWE, which provides for a special one-time dividend on TKO’s shares of Class A common stock, funded by an intracompany cash distribution to TKO prior to the consummation of the transaction. The dividend to TKO’s Class A common stockholders will be $3.86 per share, payable on September 29, 2023 to TKO’s Class A common stockholders of record as of September 22, 2023.
Future declarations of dividends are subject to the determination and discretion of TKO’s board of directors based on its consideration of various factors, such as its results of operations, financial condition, market conditions, earnings, cash flow requirements, restrictions in its debt agreements, legal requirements and other factors that TKO’s board of directors deems relevant.
Meanwhile, UFC Senior EVP and COO Lawrence Epstein has been quite ambitious about creating a crossover between the WWE and UFC fanbases in the advent of the merger. He said,
“Where we want to get is where every UFC fan is a WWE fan and every WWE fan is a UFC fan.”
During a recent DWCS press conference, UFC President Dana White stated that a crossover is unlikely as there is very little synergy between the audiences of both companies. He said,
“Lawrence, I love you, one of the dumbest statements of all time. I don’t know why he said that. I don’t even know what to say to that. No. There is no…there is some crossover. Some people like WWE, some people like UFC, some people like both. I don’t think there is ever going to be a day where we turn every UFC fan to a WWE fan or every WWE…what’s beautiful about the synergy between these two fanbases is they are very completely opposite. There is very little crossover. Maybe he was misquoted, I hope that was the case because I could not disagree with him more.”
