On Tuesday former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer officially became the new owner of the Los Angeles Clippers with the fellow NBA owners unanimously voting 29-0 in his favor. Of course they were more than happy to vote him in as his whopping $2 billion purchase raises the value of every team in the league. The record breaking sale pummels the next highest sale which was the Milwaukee Bucks who were sold for $550 million in May. So how does Ballmer feel about the money he’s shelling out?
He tells ESPN:
“Lots of people run lots of numbers. I feel like I paid a price I’m excited about. It obviously was a price that was negotiated and I feel very good about it. It’s not a cheap price, but when you’re used to looking at tech companies with huge risk, no earnings and huge multiples, this doesn’t look like the craziest thing I’ve ever acquired. It’s my own personal money, and you’re just as careful with your own money as you are with your shareholders money. And compared to some of the public traded companies, there are great companies out there like Amazon with absolutely no earnings and a huge market caps and lots of risk. There’s much less risk. There’s real earnings in this business. There’s real upside opportunity. So compared to the things I looked at in tech, this was a reasonable purchase and it’s one I’m really excited about. Plus, I’m really excited about the product. I love it. I’ve been over a hundred basketball games in the last year and that’s just high school games.”
