Formula One sale decision by start of next season – Ecclestone

BERLIN (Reuters) – The owners of Formula One will make a decision on whether to sell before the start of the next season in March, the sport’s commercial supremo Bernie Ecclestone told German daily Handelsblatt.

“I believe we will decide in the next few months. I hope we will know for sure before the start of the next season whether CVC will sell, or not,” the F1 chief executive was quoted as saying in an interview published on Thursday.

Ecclestone said that there were some people who would like to buy Formula One but that in reality, there were around only four interested parties that would actually have the necessary finances to buy the asset should CVC decide to sell.

When asked whether he would sell his own stake of 5 percent, Ecclestone said he hadn’t thought about it.

CVC Capital Partners are currently the controlling shareholders with a 35.5 percent stake, while Ecclestone holds 5.3 percent.

U.S. investment groups BlackRock and Waddell & Reed, along with Norway’s Norges Bank, are among other shareholders.

CVC had previously said in July that the rights holders were under no pressure to sell.

(Reporting by Victoria Bryan; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)