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Green Bay Packers to Sell $90 Million Worth of ‘Stock' in NFL Team, Only Sixth Time Shares Offered to Public

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  • The Green Bay Packers will sell $90 million of "stock" in the pro football team to help fund improvements at Lambeau Field.
  • It is just the sixth time in the NFL squad's storied history that it has offered shares to the public.
  • The offering was announced a day after Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers returned from a Covid reserve list to lead the team to a 17-0 win over the Seattle Seahawks.
  • The Packers were fined $300,000 by the NFL because of Rodgers' earlier violations of Covid protocol by speaking to reporters without a mask while not being vaccinated.

Cheeseheads, get your stock here!

The Green Bay Packers on Tuesday will offer to sell $90 million of "stock" in the NFL team to help fund improvements at Lambeau Field, just the sixth time in the squad's storied history that it has offered shares to the public.

The offering of 300,000 shares will begin at 9 a.m. ET Tuesday, with a price of $300 per share, the Packers said in a statement Monday.

The sale, which will run through Feb. 25, was approved in late October by the National Football League.

The stock has no underlying value and cannot be traded on open markets.

The last time that the publicly owned, nonprofit Wisconsin corporation that owns the Packers sold shares was in 2011. Earlier Packer stock sales were in 1923, 1935, 1950 and 1997.

"Stock in the Packers does not constitute an investment in 'stock' in the common sense of the term," the Packers noted in a press release about the offering.

"Anyone considering the purchase of Packers stock should not purchase the stock to make a profit or to receive a dividend or tax deduction or any other economic benefits."

About 5,009,000 shares of Packers stock are currently held by about 361,300 stockholders, according to the team.

The team, which has a famously loyal fan base, is the only one in the National Football league to have a public ownership structure.

Packers CEO Mark Murphy said, "We appreciate the interest that fans have expressed in our sixth stock offering."

"While we are not yet in a position to fully discuss the offering, we do have some initial information that we can share for fans to consider. We look forward to formally launching the offering tomorrow," Murphy said.

Purchasers of the stock must live in the U.S., the U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico or Guam and cannot buy more than 200 shares.

Stock purchased by a person in the 1997-1998 and 2011-2012 share offerings by the Packers is counted against that maximum.

The team said, "More information, including the formal offering document, will be available when the offering commences."

"Interested fans will be able to access the full information tomorrow online at www.packers.com," the Packers said.

The offering was announced a day after star Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers returned to the squad from the Covid-19 reserve list after missing last week's game to lead the team to a 17-0 win over the Seattle Seahawks.

After Rodgers reportedly tested positive for the coronavirus, the Packers last week were fined $300,000 by the NFL because of Rodgers' earlier violations of Covid protocol by speaking to reporters without a mask while not being vaccinated.

Rodgers personally was fined $14,650 for attending a Halloween party with teammates without wearing a mask.

Rodgers misled the public about his vaccination status in August by saying he was immunized and by not correcting subsequent reports that said he was vaccinated.

"I made some comments that people might have felt were misleading," Rodgers told "The Pat McAfee Show" on Tuesday. "To anybody that felt misled by those comments, I take full responsibility for those comments."

The Packers are first in the NFC North divisional standings, with an 8-2 record, tied for best in the NFL.

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