The world’s wealthiest are finding new ways to deploy their fortunes beyond luxury cars and yachts—and the latest craze is soccer. Greg Penner, the multimillionaire chairman of Walmart, just added a European league to his growing portfolio of sports investments from football to baseball.
A consortium backed by some of private equity’s top billionaires and ultra-rich investors has agreed to buy a 42% stake in Spanish soccer club Valencia CF, now valued at €1.2 billion ($1.34 billion). The deal was led by Pitchwise Holdings, whose notable investors include KKR co-founders Henry Kravis (worth $17.4 billion) and George Roberts (worth $17.7 billion). Another notable backer was Penner Sports, the family and sports investment vehicle run by Penner and his wife Carrie, the granddaughter of Walmart founder Sam Walton.
The Valencia club will also receive around €100 million (nearly $112 million) in capital injection as part of the investment.
“The club has all the building blocks needed to be a leading club in Europe in both men’s and women’s football,” Ann Rodriguez and Corey Woolfolk, general partners at Pitchwise, said in a press release. “However, we also know that the regulatory and competitive landscape of the modern game means that potential alone is not enough – it requires a clear investment strategy and focus.”
The investment comes as billionaires like Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and American property magnate Stanley Kroenke have poured money into European soccer clubs as another way to put their fortunes to work. And this isn’t the first time the Walmart chairman splurged on sports—Valencia CF is only the newest addition to his global investments.
Fortune reached out to Walmart and Pitchwise for comment.
Greg and Carrie Penners’ investments from the NFL to MLB
Greg and Carrie Penner have been building a sports investment portfolio for years, starting with one of the NFL’s most valuable franchises before expanding into new sports and international markets.
In 2022, the Walton-Penner Family Ownership Group (now Penner Sports Group) acquired controlling ownership of the Denver Broncos for $4.65 billion.
The Walmart chairman is now five seasons in as the NFL team’s owner and CEO—and the investment has panned out handsomely: Forbes estimates that the Broncos are now worth $9.4 billion, more than double what the Penners bought them for.
And the team seems to have rebounded competitively; after returning to the playoffs in 2024 for the first time since 2015, Denver went 14-3 in 2025, and advanced to the conference championship game. Penner has said the potential criticisms and challenges of running a competitive NFL team—on top of his executive duties—are well worth it.
“We love a challenge. We love to compete. The NFL is one of the premier places to do that,” Penner said in a 2022 interview. “And at the same time we have a chance to build a business around it, do it as a family endeavor which is a lot of fun.”
Earlier this year, the couple expanded their sports portfolio through Penner Sports Group’s investment in the Colorado Rockies.
They’re currently the largest minority owners of the MLB team, though the purchase price was never disclosed. It’s estimated that the team is currently worth $1.68 billion, according to Forbes, valuing the Penners’ stake at roughly $672 million. Multiple sources also report that the Penners “intend to take over” the Rockies from primary owners Dick and Charlie Monfort and purchase an additional 35% stake next year when MLB returns.
The billionaires backing European sports leagues
Penner isn’t the only ultra-rich American putting their money towards European sports leagues.
Earlier this year, Bezos joined the consortium buying around 30% of Liverpool FC. The group, led by British-Indian investor Amit Bhatia, made a provisional offer of £1.35 billion (nearly $1.8 billion) to buy a minority stake from Fenway Sports Groups (FSG)—valuing the Premier League club at around £4.5 billion (around $6 billion).
And in 2022, the CEO of holding company Eldridge Industries Todd Boehly, led a consortium that bought Chelsea F.C. for £4.25 billion—about $5.2 billion at the time. The American businessman, worth around $9.2 billion, snapped up the team from Russian business oligarch Roman Abramovich, who was forced to sell.
Stanely Kroenke, worth $29.1 billion, also bought up popular Premier League team Arsenal over the span of a decade. Starting back in 2007, Kroenke started off by acquiring a 9.9% stake in Arsenal holdings, becoming a majority owner in 2011 with 62% of shares under his name, eventually taking on full ownership in 2018. In total, it’s estimated he shelled out roughly $1 billion to buy the franchise.
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