An agreement to make public the Topps Co. has been overturned after Major League Baseball said it would not renew its 70-year-old exclusive relationship with the trading card company.
On Friday, a day after MLB announced its surprise surprise withdrawal of Topps in favor of sports merchandising giant Fanatics, hedge fund Mudrick Capital said in a statement that its agreement to merge Topps with a “blank check” company “to make it public” has ended by mutual agreement. “
The so-called Mudrick Special Purchasing Company, or SPAC, was expected to close its merger with Topps on August 27 and would begin trading on the Nasdaq on August 30. People close to Topps say the company was only informed Thursday afternoon that MLB would end the deal established since 1952.
The deal, which was announced in April, at the height of NFT fashion, was valued at $ 1.3 billion. At the time, Topps said he planned to capitalize on the demand for non-expendable tokens by selling baseball-related digital assets.
A source close to Mudrick Capital noted that the SPAC has until September 2022 to find a target. On the one hand, Mudrick “returns to the top spot,” but the company “had a lot of offers” before announcing its plans to merge with Topps in April, according to the source.
For now, Topps will remain private with prominent Disney president Michael Eisner.
“Topps expects to be able to produce substantially all of its current licensed baseball products by 2025, in accordance with its existing agreement,” the company said in a statement.
Topps also has other assets, including a confectionery business that makes base chewing gum and pop ring.
Shares of the SPAC, which are listed under the MUDS symbol, fell from about $ 11 per share Thursday at noon to less than $ 10 for Friday, recently changing hands to $ 9.85.