Toto Wolff Preparing to Sell Stake Pricing Mercedes F1 at £4.6bn
Toto Wolff is engaged in advanced talks to sell a portion of his shareholding in the Mercedes F1 outfit.
The deal estimates Mercedes at £4.6 billion – a record for an F1 team – after McLaren was appraised at £3.5bn in a change of corporate structure in September.
The Austrian executive, who holds a 33% stake of the Mercedes F1 operation, would sell a stake approximately five percent.
The 53-year-old will remain as team boss and chief executive officer if the sale goes through.
Ownership Breakdown
The other shareholders in Mercedes F1 are Mercedes and industrial group Ineos Group, who each also own a third of the enterprise.
An official representative said: "We are providing no official statement on this. The governance of the team will remain unaltered, and each shareholder are dedicated to continued achievements of Mercedes-Benz in F1."
Valuation Increase
The deal would represent a substantial rise in value of the Mercedes team since Ineos Group bought its stake for £208m in 2022.
The rise reflects the growth in valuations of Formula 1 outfits in the past few years due to the growing popularity of Formula 1 around the world.
This trend was evident with the success of the F1 movie starring Hollywood star Brad Pitt, which was released last summer and has grossed more than $630m (£458 million) at the box office.
It is Pitt's most successful movie and the highest-earning sports movie ever released.
Current Performance
The Mercedes team are second in the team standings, trailing McLaren Racing, with three races remaining in the current championship.
Their lead driver George Russell has won 2 of the 21 grands prix so far and is fourth in the individual standings after McLaren drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, and Red Bull's Max Verstappen.
The team secured a unprecedented eight consecutive team titles and seven driver championships, six won by Lewis Hamilton and one by Nico Rosberg, between 2014 to 2021.
