The Wall Street Journal reported today that Vince McMahon is “plotting” a return to power in WWE in advance of pursuing a sale of the entire company. McMahon remains the primary stockholder of WWE.
The article states, “Mr. McMahon, who has majority voting power through his ownership of WWE’s Class-B stock, has told the company that he is electing himself and two former co-presidents and directors, Michelle Wilson and George Barrios, to the board, the people said. The move to reinstate Mr. McMahon, which the board previously rebuffed, and the others will require three current directors to vacate their positions.”
Per the report, McMahon sent the company’s current Board of Directors a letter last month, “detailing his desire to return to the company he ran for four decades, to help spearhead a strategic-review process, the people said. Mr. McMahon believes there is a narrow window to kick off a sales process because WWE’s media rights—including for its flagship programs “Raw” and “SmackDown”—are about to be renegotiated, according to the people.”
The WSJ reports the Board of Directors responded they were “prepared to initiate a review process and would welcome working with him on it. However, it said it unanimously agreed that Mr. McMahon’s return to the business wouldn’t be in shareholders’ best interest, according to people familiar with the letters.”
The Board asked McMahon “to confirm his commitment to repay expenses incurred by WWE related to an investigation of the allegations and requested that he agree not to return to the company during government probes of the matter, the people said. Mr. McMahon said in response that he remains willing to continue working to complete any reimbursement for reasonable expenses related to the investigation, to the extent they aren’t covered by insurance, but he declined to agree to not return to the company.”
McMahon has reportedly told the Board of Directors that unless he has “direct involvement” as Executive Chairman “from the outset of a strategic review,” McMahon would not support or approve “any media-rights deal or sale.”
As previously reported, after McMahon resigned from WWE as the former CEO and Chairman last July due to a hush money scandal, he wanted to come back because he believed he was badly advised by those close to him when he decided to retire.
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