FILE - The Portland Trail Blazers officially have a new owner: a group of investors led by billionaire Tom Dundon, pictured here in 2019.
Chris Seward / AP
The Portland Trail Blazers officially have a new owner: a group of investors led by billionaire Tom Dundon.
The NBA Board of Governors approved the sale of controlling interest in the Portland Trail Blazers from Paul Allen’s estate to a group led by Dundon on Monday.
The league said in a statement it expects the deal to close this week. A spokesperson for the Blazers did not have additional comment and referred to the NBA’s two-sentence release.
According to The Athletic, which first reported the approval, the deal is valued at approximately $4.25 billion. In March, the Boston Celtics sold for $6.1 billion.
It’s the first ownership change for the Blazers since Allen, the Microsoft cofounder, bought the team in 1988.
Dundon’s ownership group includes Portland-based Sheel Tyle, the co-founder of investment firm Collective Global; Marc Zahr, co-president of Blue Owl Capital; and the Cherng Family Trust, the family office and investment firm of the co-founders of Panda Express.
Earlier this month, Dundon sold a portion of the NHL’s Carolina Hurricanes to three new minority owners, a transaction reportedly worth $332.5 million for 12.5% of the team.
Dundon bought a stake in the Hurricanes in 2017, became the majority owner in 2018 and took sole possession of the club in 2021. He is chairman and managing partner of the Dallas-based firm Dundon Capital Partners.
The approval of the Trail Blazers’ sale comes after the Oregon Legislature approved funds for the renovation of the Moda Center in early March. The measure gives the state joint ownership of the 30-year-old arena with the city and provides a mechanism to secure $365 million for the building’s renovation. It also allayed fears that new ownership might move the team to another city.
OPB and ProPublica have reported in recent months that the Oregon Department of Justice investigated companies Dundon either ran or is an investor in.
In 2020, Oregon was part of a coalition of states that sued Dundon’s former company, Santander Consumer USA, for allegedly preying on Oregonians through high-interest car loans they couldn’t afford in a case involving more than 265,000 borrowers nationwide.
The state’s then-attorney general called Santander Consumer’s business practices “predatory and harmful” and said they “will not be tolerated in Oregon.” The company agreed to a $550 million settlement and admitted no wrongdoing.
While Dundon had been gone for years, new documents obtained by OPB and ProPublica reveal Dundon was behind what regulators called an “aggressive push” to waive proof-of-income requirements at Santander Consumer.
Dundon has declined to comment until after March 31, when the deal is expected to close. The Oregon Department of Justice confirmed it is also part of a separate multi-state investigation into another auto loan company, Exeter Finance. Dundon has served as chairman of its board and the website lists him as an investor.
Allen’s estate announced last May that it had begun the process of selling the Trail Blazers. The billionaire co-founder of Microsoft, who died in 2018 at age 65 from complications of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, bought the Blazers in 1988 for $70 million.
Allen also owned the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks and a minority share of Major League Soccer’s Seattle Sounders.
Since his death, Allen’s sister, Jody Allen, has served as chair of both the Blazers and Seahawks and is a trustee of the Paul G. Allen Trust. Paul Allen stipulated in his will the eventual sale of his teams, with the proceeds to be given to philanthropic endeavors. Allen’s estate announced it began the process of selling the Seahawks in mid-February, about two weeks after the team captured the franchise’s second Super Bowl championship.
OPB’s Conrad Wilson contributed to this report.
