Toto Wolff is engaged in final negotiations to offload a portion of his ownership stake in the Mercedes F1 outfit.
This transaction values the Mercedes team at £4.6bn – a record for an F1 team – after the McLaren team were valued at £3.5bn in an adjustment to ownership structure in September.
Wolff, who holds a 33% stake of the Mercedes F1 operation, plans to divest a shareholding in the region of 5%.
Wolff, aged 53 would stay on as team principal and CEO if the sale goes through.
Ownership Structure
The other shareholders in Mercedes F1 are Mercedes and chemicals giant Ineos, who each also own one-third of the enterprise.
A Mercedes spokesperson stated: "We will be making no comment on this. The governance of the team stays unchanged, and all three partners are fully committed to continued achievements of Mercedes-Benz in F1."
Valuation Increase
The deal would represent a substantial rise in worth of the Mercedes team after Ineos bought its share for £208m in 2022.
The rise demonstrates the expansion in market values of F1 teams recently as a consequence of the growing popularity of Formula 1 globally.
This was also seen in the success of the F1 movie featuring Brad Pitt, which debuted in summer 2023 and earned more than $630m (£458 million) at the box office.
The film represents Pitt's most successful movie and the highest-earning sports movie to date.
Present Performance
The Mercedes team are runner-up in the constructors' championship, trailing McLaren Racing, with three Grands Prix remaining this season.
Mercedes' primary racer British driver George Russell has won two of the 21 races this year and is fourth in the individual standings behind McLaren's Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, and Red Bull's Max Verstappen.
The team secured a record eight consecutive constructors' championships and seven driver championships, six won by Lewis Hamilton and one by Nico Rosberg, from 2014 and 2021.
