Conor McGregor
CONOR McGREGOR has had his hands full over the last few weeks, between seeking a nomination for the presidency, announcing an MMA bout on the White House lawn next summer and keeping an eye on the alleged perjury investigation into two of the witnesses who had sought to give evidence in his favour for Nikita Hand’s civil rape case. Even so, he’ll also have been watching the share price of the US-listed MMA training company, Alta Global Group (now re-named MMA.Inc).
McGregor is a brand ambassador for the company and, along with his former coach, John Kavanagh, he is also a shareholder in MMA.Inc and the two men are keen to see a boost in the stock.
Such an outcome would have been anticipated by the decision to team up with Donald Trump Jr, who was last week announced as a “strategic advisor” to the company, with his “focus on enhancing global recognition of MMA.Inc and accelerating the commercialisation of its combat sports platforms, technology, training programs and fan engagement infrastructure”.
Goldhawk had not previously been aware of Junior’s experience in combat sports platforms, training programmes or fan engagement but the board may have been aware that the son of a sitting president could give the share price a real jolt.
McGregor added a line or two to the press release, gushing about how “Don is a globally recognised business leader” and he “couldn’t be more excited about the future we’re building together at MMA.Inc”.
The high-profile scrapper has every incentive to see the share price rise, given that it’s a significant aspect of his job with the company. A year ago he was brought on as a brand ambassador with a mission to use his enormous social media platform to nudge the price up through certain milestones, which could net him up to $14m should the shares eventually reach $20.
Unfortunately, the price has in fact plummeted since the deal was first announced, meaning that McGregor is actually nursing a paper loss at the moment. The initial chunk of shares he was given was theoretically worth $525,000 but they had fallen to $120,000 in value by the time of the Trump Jnr announcement.
If McGregor was hoping Li’l Donnie’s appointment as strategic advisor would drive the share price sufficiently, he will have been sorely disappointed. Granted, the announcement has helped to more than double MMA.Inc’s share price from around $1 on September 8 to an initial $2.57 the next day but they dropped back to $1.85 by the end of the week, half the price of $3.50 a year ago when the ‘Notorious’ signed his three-year deal with the group.
And he remains pretty far off the pace the board set for him 12 months ago. The next target is $7.50, then $10, then $15 and finally $20. He may need to roll out the entire Trump family if he’s to get that $14m.
