Toto Wolff is in final negotiations to offload part of his shareholding in the Mercedes F1 outfit.
This transaction values Mercedes at £4.6 billion – an unprecedented figure for a Formula 1 squad – after the McLaren team was appraised at £3.5 billion in a change of corporate structure in September.
The Austrian executive, who holds a 33% stake of the Mercedes F1 operation, would sell a shareholding in the region of five percent.
The 53-year-old will remain as team boss and chief executive officer should the deal proceed.
Ownership Breakdown
Remaining partners in the team are Mercedes-Benz and industrial group Ineos Group, who both hold a third of the enterprise.
An official representative stated: "We will be making no comment on the matter. The governance of the team will remain unchanged, and each shareholder are fully committed to continued achievements of Mercedes-Benz in F1."
Valuation Growth
The deal signifies a significant increase in value of the Mercedes team since Ineos bought its stake for £208 million in 2022.
The rise demonstrates the expansion in valuations of F1 teams recently due to the increasing appeal of the sport globally.
This trend was evident with the box-office performance of the F1 movie featuring Brad Pitt, which was released last summer and earned more than $630 million (£458 million) at cinemas worldwide.
It is Pitt's most successful movie and the highest-earning sports movie ever released.
Current Performance
The Mercedes team are runner-up in the constructors' championship, trailing McLaren Racing, with three Grands Prix left in the current championship.
Mercedes' primary racer British driver George Russell has won two of the 21 races this year and is in fourth place in the individual standings after McLaren's Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, and Red Bull Racing's Max Verstappen.
Mercedes won a record eight straight team titles and seven driver championships, six for Lewis Hamilton and one by Nico Rosberg, from 2014 to 2021.
