Last November, Apollo Global Management bought Atlético de Madrid for €2.5 billion. Most coverage focused on the football club. The deal documents told a different story.

€800 million of that valuation was undeveloped land in Madrid.

A 20,000-seat arena designed for 120 events per year, not just football matches, but concerts, esports tournaments, corporate gatherings. Luxury residential towers. Commercial space that operates every day of the year. Training facilities that double as event venues.

According to SportBusiness, what began as negotiations for a $500 million funding round evolved into a full acquisition when Apollo's leadership recognized they weren't buying a sports team.

They were buying a development license that cities can't approve through any other mechanism.

The football club isn't the asset. It’s the catalyst that aligns civic interests, capital, and long-term development.

We've been tracking this shift for years: sports franchises becoming collateral for infrastructure deals that wouldn't otherwise move forward.

You can't get a mixed-use development approved in most cities without:

But attach it to a stadium deal?

Suddenly, you have tax increment financing, hotel tax redirects, and the votes to break ground.

Apollo raised a $5 billion sports fund, but not because they care about La Liga. They raised it because sports infrastructure is the only remaining path to large-scale urban development in markets where everything else is gridlocked.

The Ciudad del Deporte wasn't adjacent to the investment thesis. It was the entire point.

The football matches generate foot traffic. The surrounding real estate captures the economic value of that traffic through hotels, residential, retail, and events that have nothing to do with the game schedule.

This is what 2026 will demonstrate at scale.

The 2026 FIFA World Cup starts in June across 16 North American cities.

Dallas: hosting nine matches at AT&T Stadium. Tickets selling for up to $3,200.

But developers didn't wait for the tournament announcement to start positioning. The entertainment district surrounding AT&T Stadium has been under construction for years, not because of the World Cup specifically, but because the World Cup provided political justification for infrastructure spending that cities needed to do anyway.

Atlanta: invested heavily in transit corridors, pedestrian infrastructure, and public space improvements tied to hosting eight matches at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

Those matches will conclude in July 2026.
The transit improvements will compound value for decades.

New York/New Jersey: MetLife Stadium has become an anchor for mixed-use development targeting not the tournament itself, but the long-term brand effect of having hosted a global event in a media capital.

The pattern we're watching: cities use sports as political cover for infrastructure investment they should have funded through conventional channels.

The tournament is the excuse.
The real estate is the actual outcome.

While FIFA and the Olympics dominate headlines, private equity has quietly consolidated youth sports infrastructure into a $70 billion industry that operates 52 weekends per year with:

LakePoint Sports (Cartersville, Georgia): What began as a 1,300-acre baseball and softball complex north of Atlanta has evolved into a full-scale sports tourism ecosystem. The facility hosts over 4 million visitors annually and generates more than $500 million in annual economic impact: not from ticket sales, but from hotel stays, restaurant visits, and retail spending across multi-day tournament weekends.

Arizona Athletic Grounds (Mesa, Arizona): a tournament facility that catalyzed development of a multibillion-dollar, 200-acre mixed-use district.

The fields aren't the business model.
The fields are the anchor.
The business model is capturing three-day family trips every weekend of the year.

Marvella Sports Capital (Indianapolis): following the same framework with hotel tax redirects and tax increment financing. These projects aren't funded as public amenities. They're funded as economic development infrastructure with measurable hotel occupancy and sales tax returns.

American families spent $40 billion on youth sports in 2024, which is double the entire revenue of the NFL.

Private equity recognized that tournament complexes are infrastructure plays with:

The youth sports boom isn't about participation rates. It's about recognizing that a tournament facility is a hotel demand generator operating year-round with municipal support.

SoFi Stadium (Inglewood): Stan Kroenke invested $5 billion into the complex. The stadium hosts 50-60 events annually. The adjacent Hollywood Park district including apartments, retail, dining, and entertainment generates revenue 365 days a year.

The Rams and Chargers are anchor tenants.
The surrounding district is the actual business.

The Battery Atlanta: office tower, residential, restaurants, live music venue surrounding Truist Park. The Braves play 81 home games. The Battery operates every day.

Research published in the Journal of Sports Economics found properties within a mile of NFL stadiums saw rents increase by 9%, but that's just the blunt measurement. The real returns are in mixed-use districts that activate independently of game schedules.

Chase Center (San Francisco): two eleven-story office buildings in "Thrive City" with tech companies as tenants.

The Warriors play 41 home games per season.
The office buildings generate lease revenue regardless of the NBA calendar.

The fundamental shift: stadiums surrounded by parking lots were single-use infrastructure with limited revenue capture. Stadiums surrounded by residential, office, retail, and hospitality are year-round economic engines.

The franchise justifies the public subsidy.
The mixed-use district captures the financial return.

The 2026 World Cup compresses a decade of infrastructure investment into an 18-month timeline. Necessary transit upgrades, pedestrian corridors, and public space improvements are projects that typically face years of delays get fast-tracked because the deadline is immovable and the political cost of failure is too high.

LA 2028 is two years out, making 2026 the critical preparation window.

Los Angeles adopted a "no-build" Olympic strategy, using existing venues instead of constructing new permanent structures. That decision redirected $900 million in federal funding toward transit infrastructure instead of stadium construction.

Neighborhoods near Olympic venues such as Inglewood, Downtown LA, and Westwood tracked 20-30% real estate appreciation through 2025. Properties in Inglewood that sold for $300,000 in 2019 exceeded $1 million by late 2025.

Not because of the Olympics specifically.
But because the Olympics provided cover for infrastructure investment that should have happened decades ago.

Youth sports complexes attracted over $5 billion in private equity investment in 2025 as repeatable infrastructure plays that generate tourism revenue every weekend without the complexity of professional team ownership.

And institutional investors deployed over $19 billion into sports franchises and surrounding infrastructure in 2025, not because teams became better businesses, but because they recognized sports franchises unlock development opportunities that don't exist through conventional channels.

We've spent years tracking how performance culture reshapes physical infrastructure. Not through boutique fitness studios or wellness retreats, but through the systematic reorganization of how cities allocate capital and approve development.

Sports franchises have become municipal development licenses.

The financial returns don't come from ticket sales or broadcast rights. They come from capturing economic activity that concentrates around venues designed to operate 100+ days per year:

The Apollo-Atlético deal isn't an outlier. It's the blueprint.

€800 million of real estate development justified by a football club that generates political support for projects that would never clear approval otherwise.

Youth tournament complexes attract billion-dollar investments and hotel tax financing because they generate measurable economic returns every single weekend.

Stadium districts evolved into mixed-use neighborhoods because developers finally recognized that the franchise is just the anchor, and the business is everything that surrounds it.

2025 was about capital moving into position.

2026 is about cities executing infrastructure projects they've been designing around sports anchors for years:

The performance economy we've been writing about isn't about biohacking supplements or elite athlete protocols.

It's about cities reorganizing around infrastructure that supports how people actually want to live:

Sports franchises didn't suddenly become better businesses. They became better collateral.

And 2026 is when we'll see exactly how much infrastructure collateral unlocks.

This newsletter is for informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice, an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy any securities. All financial data presented represents historical performance of specific venues and should not be construed as indicative of future results. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Investment in sports venues and related assets involves significant risk, including potential loss of principal. The behavioral economics concepts discussed are based on academic research and historical case studies that may not apply to all situations or guarantee similar outcomes. No representation is made that any investment approach discussed herein will or is likely to achieve results similar to those shown. Any investment decision should be made only after careful consideration of all relevant factors and consultation with qualified financial, tax, and legal advisors. Momentous Sports and Magnolia Hill Partners make no representations or warranties regarding the accuracy or completeness of this information and disclaim any liability arising from your use of this information. This material has not been prepared in accordance with requirements designed to ensure unbiased reporting, and there are no restrictions on trading in the securities discussed herein prior to publication. For qualified accredited investors interested in learning more about our educational materials and investment approach, please contact us directly for a confidential discussion.