777 Partners step up exit plan as Everton takeover problems continue

The American investment firm that continues to hold out hope of acquiring Everton has engaged an investment bank to sell one of the teams under its ownership.

Miami-based 777 Partners, who agreed to purchase current Everton owner Farhad Moshiri’s 94.1% shareholding in the Toffees in September last year, have, according to reports in Belgium via the outlet L’Avenir, engaged investment bank Moelis to oversee the sales process for Standard Liege.

The report claims that expressions of interest have already been received but that the process would likely take some time. Sources that the ECHO has spoken to have also claimed that the idea of a Standard Liege sale being concluded to aid the purchase of Everton is ‘highly unlikely’ and that the funds generated would not be sufficient enough to get it over the line given the struggle of the company to attract other avenues of financing at present.

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Standard, one of Belgian football’s most storied clubs, has been under the ownership of 777 Partners since 2022. However, with the US owners mired in controversy over legal disputes relating to monies owed, allegations of fraudulent practice in a civil suit filed in New York, and having seen a commercial airline it owns fall into voluntary administration, problems have arrived for the Pro League side in recent times.

Last month saw missed payments for staff wages, while earlier this month saw a Liege court seize the football assets of 777 in Belgium over a dispute with the former owner regarding the failure to make the agreed payments for the 2022 purchase of the club.

Standard Liege is one of several clubs 777 Partners own, with Vasco da Gama, Red Star Paris, Hertha Berlin, Melbourne Victory, and Genoa also among them. Last week a court in Brazil removed control of Vasco da Gama from 777 Partners, who launched a legal battle of its own on Tuesday in an attempt to wrestle back control of the club.

It has been widely reported that Moshiri had provided 777 Partners with an extension until the end of the month, with a deadline of May 31, to find the necessary funds to complete the protracted takeover of the club, which was granted conditional approval by the Premier League back in May on the proviso that four conditions were met.

Those conditions were that 777 Partners’ interest-bearing loans to the club for working capital purposes, which now sits at just north of £200m, have to be converted into equity; funds are required in an escrow account to meet financial obligations for the remainder of the season; proof of funding for the new stadium completion; and a £158m loan to be repaid to MSP Sports Capital.

It is understood that Moshiri continues to look at alternative options with the likelihood of 777 Partners taking over the club looking increasingly remote. Even if the firm managed to raise the funds required to complete it looks improbable that the bid would pass muster with the Premier League even with the conditions set out given what has transpired since March.

777 Partners co-founders Josh Wander and Steven Pasko have been removed from the board of directors after restructuring experts were brought in to try and turn the company around, while Wander and Pasko have also stepped down from the board of 777’s football operations, which is currently being led by ex-City Football Group man Don Dransfield.

The last two months have seen 777 Partners’ bid to acquire the club fall apart as the company’s business interests have started to unravel.

Allegations of non-payment of monies owed have followed the ownership group around for some time, and the civil suit filed in a New York court was brought by London-based Leadenhall Capital, who allege that fraudulent practice took place with regard to a $600m financing deal where collateral that was provided by 777 for the money either did not exist, were not actually owned by Wander’s entities, or that they had been promised as collateral to another lender.

Earlier this year 777 was handed a major blow when its main source of financing, another Miami-based investment firm, A-CAP, was recommended by two US state regulators to reduce its exposure to 777 Partners due to the nature of its investments. A-CAP began that divestment soon after.