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The NHL's Ottawa Senators Are Going Up For Sale
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Hey Friends,
The Ottawa Senators have retained Galatioto Sports Partners — a bank that focuses exclusively on providing non-securities advisory services to the sports industry — to seek a sale of the National Hockey League (NHL) franchise, according to Sportico.
The proposed sale comes just months after late owner Eugene Melnyk passed away at the age of 62 after battling an illness. Melnyk left the team to his two daughters, Anna and Olivia, but they are both less than 25 years old and appear ready to move on from ownership (a three-person board is currently executing the team’s day-to-day ownership operations).
So what’s the price? Well, oddly enough, this news went public the same day that Sportico released its annual NHL franchise valuations list.
Top Ten Most Valuable NHL Clubs
Toronto Maple Leafs: $2.12 billion (+6% YoY)
New York Rangers: $2.01 billion (+7.5%)
Montreal Canadiens: $1.70 billion (+7.5%)
Chicago Blackhawks: $1.44 billion (+5.8%)
Boston Bruins: $1.41 billion (+7.6%)
Los Angeles Kings: $1.39 billion (+9.5%)
Philadelphia Flyers: $1.35 billion (+8.0%)
Edmonton Oilers: $1.29 billion (+11.2%)
Washington Capitals: $1.22 billion (+4.3%)
Detroit Red Wings: $1.12 billion (+8.4%)
The average valuation across the NHL came in at $1.01 billion (+9% YoY), and the Ottawa Senators are the NHL’s 27th most-valuable team (out of 32) at $655 million.
The Senators are currently ranked 26th in fan attendance and haven’t made the playoffs since 2017, but they are coming out of a rebuild with a solid group of players (Brady Tkachuk, Alex DeBrincat, Tim Stützle, Josh Norris, and Claude Giroux) and their valuation jumped 21% this year, the highest YoY increase of any NHL team.
Of course, there are still some unknown factors. For example, the Senators currently play sixteen miles away from downtown Ottawa—and this suburban location is reportedly part of the reason why the team has struggled with attendance.
But this past June, the team signed a memorandum of understanding for a new arena located in the downtown Ottawa area. The team is reportedly looking to sign a long-term lease agreement for land in the area, and they are already working with Sterling Project Development (UBS Arena), Populus (Climate Pledge Arena and T-Mobile Arena), Tipping Point Sports and Live Nation as investors in the project.
So maybe that ends up increasing the price of the team. But if we want to just use the standard 5-6x revenue multiple that NHL teams are currently valued at, that would give us a sale price of $670 million to $804 million (based on $134M of 2022 revenue).
So if the Senators were able to sell for somewhere between $650 million to $800 million, that would be the fourth-highest NHL franchise sale in history.
Top NHL Franchise Sales In History
Toronto Maple Leafs: $1.3 billion (2011)
Pittsburgh Penguins: $900 million (2021)
Nashville Predators*: $775 million (*In process of being finalized)
Montreal Canadiens: $575 million (2009)
Las Vegas Golden Knights: $500 million (2016)
New York Islanders: $485 million (2014)
Carolina Hurricanes: $420 million (2018)
New Jersey Devils: $320 million (2011)
Florida Panthers: $250 million (2013)
Minnesota Wild: $250 million (2008)
And while a 5-6x revenue multiple significantly trails other US professional sports leagues (due to a lower prospect of growth), the Melnyk family will still probably be happy — they bought the team and its current arena for just $92 million in 2003.
I hope everyone has a great day. We’ll talk tomorrow.
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