Free NewsletterPro Login
S&P 500 6,287 +0.42%
DOW 44,521 -0.18%
NASDAQ 21,103 +0.71%
S&P 500 +12.4%
Briefs Finance Fund +24.8%
JOIN THE FUND →

Saudi PIF Will End LIV Golf Funding After The 2026 Season

Published May 1, 2026
Listen to this article 3 min read
Share:
A golf course at dusk with a red flag on the green, sand bunker in the foreground, and stadium lights illuminating the area.
Summary:
  • The Saudi Public Investment Fund plans to end its funding of LIV Golf after the 2026 season.
  • LIV Golf's non-U.S. operations lost nearly $600 million in 2024.
  • The league is now hunting for new long-term investors as star contracts come up.

The deepest pockets in sports just told LIV Golf to find a new wallet.

Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund is ending its funding of LIV after the 2026 season, giving the league roughly seven months to figure out what comes next.

Five Years, $600 Million In Losses, Still No Merger

LIV launched in 2021 as a direct rival to the PGA Tour, spending huge sums to sign the biggest names in golf and build a global tour from scratch.

A merger with the PGA Tour was announced in 2023, but three years later that deal still has not closed, leaving LIV stuck between two business models without fully owning either.

The financials tell the rest of the story, with LIV's non-U.S. operations losing nearly $600 million in 2024 alone.

TV ratings have lagged the PGA Tour even after the league signed new broadcast deals in 2025 with FOX, IVT, DAZN and KC Global Media to put more events in front of viewers.

Revenue Up, But Not Enough

Revenue is climbing, with the league saying it is on pace for $100 million more in 2026 than the year before, helped by sponsorship deals from Rolex, HSBC, and Salesforce.

But $100 million in extra revenue is a long way from closing a $600 million annual hole.

LIV's biggest draw is its roster of star golfers, and that roster is getting expensive to keep around.

Bryson DeChambeau is a free agent at the end of this season, and Jon Rahm is on the books through 2027, meaning any new investor is buying both a league and the renewal bills that come with it.

What Happens Next

A committee of independent directors will evaluate "strategic alternatives" once PIF steps back, with LIV planning to announce its path forward Thursday.

The plan includes new board members, new leadership, and a hunt for long-term financial partners, with the league saying it is already in talks with prospective global investors.

CEO Scott O'Neil hinted at the funding cliff earlier this month at a tournament in Mexico City, comparing LIV to "any other private equity-funded business in the history of mankind."

His point: every business eventually has to pay its own bills.

Earlier this week LIV postponed a tournament scheduled for late June in New Orleans as it works through the funding question.

For investors watching the broader sports media space, the LIV situation is a live test of how much a deep-pocketed sovereign backer is actually worth when the underlying business cannot stand on its own. PIF has spent years trying to turn LIV into a self-funding asset rather than a permanent line item on its budget.

Whoever steps in after PIF will inherit a brand with global reach, a thin TV business, and a bench of stars whose contracts are mostly paid by someone else for the moment.

The league is still spending. The check that paid for it just got an expiration date.

Disclosure

Recent News

1 2 3 19

Get Market Briefs delivered to your inbox every morning for free!

No fluff. No noise. No politics. Just finance news you can read in 5 minutes.

Blogs

June 27, 2026
The act of leaving out a word or words from a sentence deliberately, when the meaning can be understood without them

What is Lorem Ipsum? Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since 1966, when designers at Letraset and James Mosley, the librarian at St Bride Printing Library in London, took a 1914 Cicero translation and scrambled it to make dummy text […]

Read More
May 5, 2026
How to Create Multiple Income Streams: A Beginner's Playbook
  • Most people rely on a single income stream from their job - which is also the most heavily taxed.
  • Multiple income streams come from a mix of cash flow, dividends, side businesses, real estate, and royalties.
  • The fastest path for most beginners is starting with one extra stream - usually dividends or a side hustle - and stacking from there.
Read More
May 5, 2026
The 60/40 Portfolio Explained: A Beginner's Guide
  • A 60/40 portfolio holds 60% in stocks and 40% in bonds (or other fixed income).
  • It's designed to balance growth from stocks with stability from bonds.
  • Your "right" mix depends on age, time horizon, income needs, and how well you sleep when markets drop.
Read More
May 5, 2026
How to Invest in Silver: A Beginner's Guide
  • Silver is both a precious metal and an industrial metal, used in solar panels, electronics, and medical tech.
  • Investors can buy silver four main ways: physical bars and coins, ETFs, mining stocks, or futures contracts.
  • Most beginners are best served by allocating a small slice of their portfolio to silver - usually between 1% and 3%.
Read More
May 1, 2026
Asset Allocation by Age: The Right Portfolio Mix at Every Stage of Life
  • Younger investors should hold mostly stocks because they have decades to recover from crashes and benefit from compounding.
  • Allocations gradually shift toward bonds and stable income as retirement approaches, but stocks remain important even past age 65 to outpace inflation.
  • Annual rebalancing is essential - it forces you to buy low and sell high while keeping your portfolio aligned with your actual life stage.
Read More
April 30, 2026
Stablecoin Explained: Why Some Cryptocurrencies Actually Aren't Volatile
  • Stablecoins are cryptocurrencies pegged to stable assets like the US dollar, giving crypto-style speed and access without the volatility of Bitcoin or Ethereum.
  • Fiat-backed stablecoins like USDC are the safest option, while algorithmic stablecoins have failed spectacularly and should generally be avoided.
  • Stablecoins fit a portfolio as cash reserves with better yields, a hedge against crypto volatility, and a fast, cheap rail for international transactions.
Read More
April 30, 2026
Buy Now, Pay Later Risks: Why This "Easy" Payment Method Is Dangerous to Your Wealth
  • Buy now, pay later services like Klarna, Affirm, and Sezzle are debt products designed to feel harmless while keeping users in a cycle of overspending.
  • BNPL exploits psychological debt blindness, triggers late fees, and damages credit scores without helping users build positive credit history.
  • Building real wealth means waiting 30 days, paying upfront when you have the cash, and avoiding systems built to extract money from your future income.
Read More
April 30, 2026
Dividend Payout Ratio: The Secret Metric That Shows If a Stock Is Safe or Risky
  • Dividend payout ratio is total dividends paid divided by net income, showing the percentage of earnings a company returns to shareholders.
  • A 20-50% payout ratio is generally safe and sustainable, while ratios above 75% often signal a dividend cut is coming.
  • High dividend yields can be warning signs, not opportunities - safety and dividend growth matter more than the headline yield number.
Read More
April 30, 2026
Ethereum for Beginners: What It Is and Why Smart Investors Are Paying Attention and this is a test heading
  • Ethereum is a blockchain platform that runs smart contracts, while Ether (ETH) is the cryptocurrency that powers the network.
  • Use cases include decentralized finance, NFTs, gaming, supply chain tracking, and digital identity - many still experimental.
  • Most investors should treat Ethereum as a small allocation hedge using dollar-cost averaging, not a get-rich-quick lottery ticket.
Read More
April 30, 2026
Dollar Cost Averaging Strategy: How to Beat Emotion and Build Wealth Steadily
  • Dollar cost averaging means investing the same amount at regular intervals regardless of what the market is doing.
  • The strategy automatically buys more shares when prices are low and fewer when prices are high, lowering your average cost over time.
  • DCA removes emotion, eliminates the need to time the market, and turns volatility into a mathematical advantage for long-term investors.
Read More
1 2 3 20
0 Shares
Share via
Copy link
Briefs WebMCP tools loaded successfully