Former New York Yankees star Alex Rodriguez joined the roster of wealthy celebrities backing blank-check companies with a filing to raise $500 million for Slam Corp.
Rodriquez is the chief executive officer of Slam, which intends to pursue businesses in the sports, media, entertainment, health and wellness and consumer technology sectors, according to its filing Thursday with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Slam specified, though, that it doesn’t intend to target professional sports franchises.
Slam Chairman Himanshu Gulati is the founder and managing partner of Antara Capital, which is backed by Blackstone Group Inc. Marc Lore, who led Walmart Inc.’s e-commerce business, will serve as a special adviser to Slam, according to the filing.
Private equity giant KKR Inc. also filed Thursday to raise $1 billion its new SPAC, KKR Acquisition Holdings I Corp.
Once an obscure investment vehicle, SPACs rocketed to new heights last year, raising $83 billion and accounting for about 46% of the sums raised in initial public offerings on U.S. exchanges, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. This year, most of the $53 billion raised in IPOs was by blank-check companies, which are on pace for another record year.
Rodriguez and KKR join a cadre of high-profile investors who have turned to SPACs. They include billionaire investors Bill Ackman, ex-Boeing Co. CEO Dennis Muilenburg and Billy Beane, the Major League Baseball executive featured in the book and movie “Moneyball.”
