After a saga that has stretched out over two years, Everton FC finally appears to have secured new ownership. Current steward of the club Farhad Moshiri has made no attempt to play down his desire to sell his shares, and at last he seems to have found a suitable investor in the form of Roma's owners The Friedkin Group. But on the other side of the city, the picture is very different, as Everton's arch-rivals Liverpool continue to benefit from a stable ownership situation that has allowed them to invest heavily in the first team squad and on club infrastructure in recent years.
In this article, we'll be diving into that backdrop by explaining who owns Liverpool FC and how they have impacted the club since taking over. After providing you with a brief history of the Merseyside giants, we'll explore how the current ownership has shaped Liverpool's modern day set-up and laid the groundwork for on-field success, while also covering where the owners got their money from and whether they've received much criticism from fans over the years.
Liverpool are one of England's oldest and most decorated football clubs. Founded in 1892, the club immediately took up residence at Anfield, an iconic ground which was first built for their rivals Everton before a land dispute prompted the Toffees to move down the road to Goodison Park. A member of the English Football League since the 1893/4 season, Liverpool FC won their first league title in 1901 and soon became stalwarts of the top flight, regularly competing at the top of the league table.
Throughout the 20th century, Liverpool enjoyed a huge amount of success, winning 18 of their 19 domestic top flight titles in this century and producing countless majestic teams led by legendary managers like Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley, with star players such as Kevin Keegan, Kenny Dalglish, John Barnes, Ian Rush, Alan Hansen, and Robbie Fowler. Throughout the 1970s and 80s they dominated English football before enduring a difficult period that saw them go 30 years without winning a title (between 1989/90 and 2019/20). Since that long-awaited triumph, Liverpool have seriously turned things around, consistently challenging Pep Guardiola's Manchester City for the Premier League title, playing scintillating football and reaching three Champions League finals under Jurgen Klopp.
That recent success was largely thanks to clever recruitment and innovative coaching, but it's worth noting that a substantial amount of money has been invested in Liverpool's squad in recent years, with the club spending a total €1.25bn in the last 10 years, including a net spend of almost €500m. So where has that money come from?
It's impossible to compete at the top of the Premier League these days without substantial financial backing. Millionaires are no longer good enough — to provide the funds needed for a top flight title bid, billionaire cash is needed. And the man who controls Merseyside's most decorated club is reportedly in the top-600-richest people in the world.
Liverpool FC is owned by Fenway Sports Group, an American multinational firm which controls a range of different sports clubs and organisations around the world. Founded in 2001 as New England Sports Ventures, the company was originally a vessel for John Henry to bid for ownership of the Boston Red Sox, an American Major League Baseball team, which he has owned since then alongside fellow investors including Tom Werner, Les Otten, and The New York Times Company. In 2011, the year after Henry's group took over Premier League club Liverpool FC, the decision was taken to change NESV's name to Fenway Sports Group (FSG).
As well as owning Premier League club Liverpool, FSG also have control of Boston Red Sox, Pittsburgh Penguins (a National Hockey League side), NASCAR's RFK Racing and TGL's Boston Common Golf. They decided to invest in English soccer back in 2010, cottoning on to the potential profitability of the sport and buying out former Liverpool owners George N. Gillett, Jr. and Tom Hicks. Since then, a number of US businesspeople have followed suit, and these days FSG are widely seen as a pioneer of American ownership in the English game. At the time of writing, 11 of the Premier League's 20 clubs are at least part-owned by Americans.
For most football fans in the UK, John Henry is the face of FSG. Born in 1949 to a family of soybean farmers in Quincy, Illinois, he moved to California as a teenager and majored in Philosophy at UCLA, but did not graduate. His first steps in the world of business were small scale; he used his knowledge of soybean farming to begin managing commodities trading in the 1970s, before setting up his own management company, John W. Henry & Company, in 1981. JWH was a huge success and by 2006 Henry was reportedly worth over $1bn. By that point, he'd already been involved in sports investment for some time, making some of his fortune from sports having bought a Minor Baseball League team back in 1989, and been in control of NBA side Orlando Magic and MLB's New York Yankees in the 1990s. He founded FSG and took over the Boston Red Sox the following decade.
Today, the American billionaire is reportedly worth a whopping $6bn according to Forbes. He bought Liverpool FC for around £300m in 2010, and his investments over the years have made it worth an estimated €4.2bn just 14 years later. Through lucrative commercial partnerships, European and domestic success, and investment in Anfield and the AXA Training Centre, the value of the club has been boosted significantly, and numerous other investors have been keen to get in on the act.
With FSG holding a majority stake of roughly 80%, there are a few other minority stakeholders involved in the Liverpool ownership landscape. RedBird Capital Partners' £533m investment in the club in 2021 makes them the second-largest shareholders with a stake of around 11%, while global sports investment firm Dynasty Equity acquired a minority share more recently. Perhaps the most high-profile minority partner is NBA icon LeBron James, who famously acquired a stake of around 2% in 2011 before converting that to a stake of FSG in 2021. This investment was made alongside James' business partner Maverick Carter. But all these people are ultimately minor figures when it comes to the Liverpool ownership — FSG's John Henry is the main man.
There has been plenty of on-field success since FSG took over Liverpool, but things off the pitch haven't always been smooth. The Liverpool owner's missteps typically relate to a lack of understanding of English football tradition and the difference between sporting culture on either side of the channel.
For example, back in 2019 FSG attempted to trademark "Liverpool", a move which was declined (and roundly criticised) because of the geographical significance of the city's name. Two years later, Liverpool's ownership, along with the rest of England's 'Big Six' clubs (Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur) caused outrage by attempting to break away from the Premier League and form a new European Super League. This new competition was widely condemned as a self-serving, undemocratic project, with UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin labelling the ESL a "spit in the face of all football lovers."
Just days after confirming its involvement in the plans, Liverpool backed out of the new elitist European project, as did all the other English clubs who put their name to it. After attempting to selfishly break away from the English football pyramid, the Liverpool owner John Henry did at least apologise to fans and seek to make amends, posting a video online in which he said: "I wanna apologise to all the fans, supporters of Liverpool Football Club, for the disruption I caused over the last 48 hours… the project put forward was never going to stand without the support of the fans. We heard you, I heard you, and I wanna apologise to Jurgen, to Billy, to the players and to everyone who works so hard at LFC to make our fans proud… they have absolutely no responsibility for this disruption."
He continued: "We've worked hard to improve your club, our work isn't done and I hope you'll understand that even when we make mistakes, we're trying to work in your club's best interests. In this endeavour I've let you down… I alone am responsible for the unnecessary negativity brought forward. It's something I won't forget."
Some fans may have been convinced by this message, but others remain critical of the Liverpool ownership. Ultimately, elite football clubs today are run as businesses, and those in control tend to be dispassionate, profit-driven and pragmatic about how they manage their investments. This can lead to shocking errors of judgement such as the European Super League debacle. But generally speaking, John Henry is still seen as someone who has helped turn Liverpool FC and create the conditions for Jurgen Klopp to drive years of success at the top of European football. He has also made mistakes, and as a result his legacy is complex, something that can be said for most modern football club owners.
Want to learn more about football club ownership at the top level of the game? Check out our article on who owns La Liga heavyweights Real Madrid.