John Textor is considering giving Everton fans the chance to buy shares in the club if he succeeds in his £600m bid to take control from Farhad Moshiri.
The American businessman is preparing to float on the New York Stock Exchange his holding company Eagle Football Group, which owns Lyon, Botafogo in Brazil and the Belgian club RWD Molenbeek and has a 45% stake in Crystal Palace, and sources close to Textor have told the Guardian that Everton could be taken public at a later date.
Textor is understood to be confident that an agreement with Moshiri over buying Everton can be reached within four weeks after he was granted exclusive negotiating rights last month. The 58-year-old has yet to sell his Palace stake, however, so approval from the Premier League could take far longer to secure.
Textor is planning to use his money and that of several unknown partners to fund the Everton purchase before absorbing the club into Eagle Football. Everton could then be listed on the stock exchange in a move which would require approval from the club’s board. Although a public flotation is rare for Premier League clubs, Manchester United and Tottenhem are listed on the New York Stock Exchange, and Arsenal shares are available to buy on the ISDX market.
The Eagle Football initial public offering (IPO) is due this month, with Textor seeking about £400m in funding. Lyon have debts of £325m which Textor refinanced last year.
A source with knowledge of the process said Textor had been preparing to float for some time, and that the addition of a Premier League club to the group would make Eagle shares far more attractive to potential investors.
Textor’s bid for Everton is complicated by the boardroom standoff at Palace because he has been unable to offload his shares despite marketing through the Raine Group since February. Negotiations with his fellow shareholders Josh Harris and David Blitzer have yet to produce an agreement, and Textor’s offer to buy them out last month was also rejected.
Textor is the fifth bidder to enter into an exclusivity agreement with Moshiri after the Kaminski Group, MSP Capital, 777 Partners and the Friedkin Group, with the previous proposals collapsing. Textor has agreed to cover Everton’s £600m-plus debts and to pay Moshiri an exit fee of which could reach £50m over the next five years, depending on the club’s football and financial performance.
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Textor declined to comment.