Playboy eyes stock market return, mulls deal with Mountain Crest: Report

Image: Instagram/playboy

Playboy Enterprises is nearing a deal with Mountain Crest Acquisition, which could value Playboy at $425 million and help it return to the stock market.

Mountain Crest, a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), might announce a merger with Playboy by the end of September, according to a Reuters report citing sources.

The talks could still collapse, the sources added.

A tie-up with Mountain Crest would result in Playboy’s return to the stock market, nine years after it went private in a $207 million deal led by its late founder Hugh Hefner and private equity firm Rizvi Traverse Management.

Moneycontrol could not independently verify the report.

Mountain Crest is in discussions with investors who would contribute around $100 million to the deal in the form of a private investment in public equity, or PIPE, transaction, the sources told the news agency.

A Playboy representative declined to comment. Mountain Crest Chief Executive Suying Liu had no comment when contacted by phone. Executives at Rizvi Traverse did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Reuters reported last week that Playboy was exploring going public through a SPAC merger. The New York Post reported the exclusive talks with Mountain Crest on Tuesday.

Mountain Crest raised $50 million in an initial public offering earlier this year with the goal of buying a private company, which would then become public as a result of the deal. SPACs have emerged in 2020 as an increasingly popular route to public markets over a traditional IPO.

Playboy stopped printing its flagship magazine earlier in 2020, ending a nearly seven-decade run on newsstands that began in 1953.

The company has expanded beyond its media business to refashion itself as a lifestyle brand and is eyeing expansion into sexual wellness.

(With inputs from Reuters)