WWE Stock Sees Significant Drop Today Following Saudi Arabia Investment Info PFL

– WWE has seen massive drops in its stock today, which appears to be the result of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund buying a minority stake into the UFC competitor, Professional Fighters League (PFL). Per Seeking Alpha, PFL partnered with SRJ Sports Investments, a fund controlled by the PIF to buy a minority stake in the PFL. The PFL will have a Middle East division that will start next year and will be held in Saudi Arabia. This appeared to have affect an affect on investors seeing significant money being invested into a UFC competitor.

While WWE is not in the MMA business, WWE is merging with Endeavor Group’s UFC as part of TKO. Endeavor Group has also seen significant drop in stock today by 10%. WWE stock opened and closed yesterday at $110.05. WWE stock has since dropped 13.6% today and currently stands at $95.15 per share.

Meanwhile, while SRJ Sports is investing $100 million to PFL, Guggenheim analyst Curry Baker doesn’t view the investment as a major “game changer” for the future of WWE or Endeavor. Baker told Seeking Alpha, “Bottomline: We do not view this as a game changer relative to the UFC’s MMA dominance. In our view, the investment is not material enough to allow PFL to compete in depth of champions or across weight classes with the UFC or start developing a monetization ecosystem to sustainably compete against the UFC.”

Baker also maintained a positive outlook on the future of UFC and WWE merger into TKO. Baker believes there will be $100 million or more in annual run-rate operating synergies for the newly merged company.