Lakers legend Kobe Bryant was paid quite handsomely during his NBA career. Off the court, he’s also one of the most marketable pro athletes in the world even to this day. Between wildly-popular signature sneakers from both Nike and Adidas, as well as countless other endorsements, he’s amassed a considerable amount of wealth.
One reason for that, clearly, is an overall wise investment strategy. But there’s also a little bit of luck involved. Just as in basketball – and everything else in life – you have to be lucky and good.
So when Kobe decided to make a relatively modest (for him) investment of $6 million in a fledgling sports drink called BodyArmor back in 2014, it was a fairly low-risk endeavor. But after Coca-Cola purchased a minority stake in the company this week, the value of its share unsurprisingly went through the roof.
Bryant made his first investment in the brand, for roughly 10 percent of the company, in March 2014, putting in a total of roughly $6 million over time. Based on the valuation of the Coca-Cola deal, his stake is now worth approximately $200 million, sources told ESPN.
Bryant is now the fourth largest investor in the brand, marketed as a healthier competitor to Gatorade, behind the brand’s co-founder Mike Repole, Coca-Cola and Keurig Dr Pepper. When he invested in BodyArmor, the brand had just come off a year of $10 million in sales. BodyArmor is projected to top $400 million in sales in 2018.
Rovell went on to say that it’s shaping up to be one of the most lucrative business investments for any pro athlete of the last 20 years. In other words, Kobe can pretty much do whatever he wants at this point, i.e. there’s no need for him to try and stage a comeback via the BIG3, no matter how much Ice Cube and the rest of us would love to see it.
(ESPN)
