UFC Antitrust Lawsuit Settles For $335 Million

Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) was hit with a class-action lawsuit back in 2014 from multiple fighters, including Cung Le, Jon Fitch, and Nate Quarry, among others, accusing the mixed martial arts (MMA) promotion and its operators of violating Section 2 of the Sherman Act.

That lawsuit has now reached a settlement agreement before heading to trial.

“On March 13, 2024, TKO reached an agreement to settle all claims asserted in both class action lawsuits (Le and Johnson) for an aggregate amount of $335 million payable by the Company and its subsidiaries in installments over an agreed-upon period of time,” TKO wrote in a recent regulation disclosure. “The terms will be memorialized in a long form agreement and then submitted to the court for approval. The Company anticipates that the settlement amount will be deductible for tax purposes.”

That’s a far cry from the billions they were seeking.

The original lawsuit was filed in 2014 and later consolidated with related cases, including the most recent action from Kajan Johnson in 2021. Johnson made headlines back in early 2017 after getting booted from the UFC fighter retreat for his outspoken views on the fighter-unfriendly Reebok deal.

The antitrust case grew to include more than 1200 athletes.

The parties representing the fighters said it was “pleased with the settlement” and will disclose more information when attorneys file with the court in the next 45-60 days. The presiding judge must first hand down preliminarily approval, pending notice to all class members, followed by final approval.

What impact this has on the promotion’s “iron grip” has yet to be determined.

Expect that to be a major talking point moving forward. The original complaint was about more than just money. It accused UFC of illegally maintaining monopoly and monoposony power by “systematically eliminating competition from rival promoters, artificially suppressing fighter earnings from bouts and merchandising and marketing activities through restrictive contracting and other exclusionary practices.”

That may never end if the settlement was nothing more than a payoff.

TKO Group Holdings, Inc., which took over for ZUFFA in summer 2016, didn’t seem to suffer much from today’s announcement. In fact, TKO stock jumped more than five points to 86.51 per share. Expect much more on this still-developing story over the next few weeks, particularly when the judge hands down final approval.