Toto Wolff is engaged in advanced talks to offload a portion of his ownership stake in the Mercedes Formula 1 team.
This transaction values Mercedes at £4.6 billion – an unprecedented figure for an F1 team – following the McLaren team was appraised at £3.5bn in a change of ownership structure last September.
The Austrian executive, who holds one-third of the Mercedes F1 operation, plans to divest a shareholding in the region of five percent.
The 53-year-old will remain as team boss and CEO if the sale goes through.
Ownership Breakdown
The other shareholders in the team are Mercedes and chemicals giant Ineos Group, who each also own a third of the enterprise.
A Mercedes spokesperson said: "We will be making no official statement on this. The management structure of the team stays unaltered, and each shareholder are fully committed to the ongoing success of the brand in F1."
Valuation Growth
This arrangement signifies a substantial rise in value of Mercedes F1 after Ineos Group bought its stake for £208m in 2022.
This surge reflects the expansion in valuations of F1 teams in the past few years due to the increasing appeal of the sport globally.
This was also seen in the success of the Formula 1 film featuring Brad Pitt, which debuted last summer and earned more than $630m (£458m) at cinemas worldwide.
It is Pitt's most successful movie and the most successful sports film ever released.
Present Standings
Mercedes are runner-up in the constructors' championship, trailing McLaren Racing, with three Grands Prix left in the current championship.
Mercedes' primary racer George Russell has won 2 of the 21 grands prix so far and is in fourth place in the drivers' championship behind McLaren drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, and Red Bull's Max Verstappen.
The team won a unprecedented eight straight constructors' championships and seven driver championships, six won by Lewis Hamilton and one by Nico Rosberg, between 2014 to 2021.