September 26, 2024
The UFC reached a new settlement in one of its antitrust lawsuits Thursday and hopes a judge will green-light it.
TKO Group — the UFC’s parent company — reached an agreement with the plaintiffs of Le v. Zuffa that will pay $375 million in the class action lawsuit in which former fighters allege the MMA promotion violated antitrust laws.
This amount exceeds the proposed $335 million settlement that Judge Richard Franklin Boulware II of the U.S. District Court of Nevada rejected in July.
Following the filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, the UFC released a statement about the settlement in the Cung Le case. However, a second antitrust lawsuit led by former UFC fighter Kajan Johnson was not mentioned in the disclosure.
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The antitrust lawsuit dates to 2014, when Zuffa was accused of violating antitrust laws by paying UFC fighters less than they were entitled to and hurting other MMA promoters with those practices. The lawsuit also alleges that the UFC has gained an unfair advantage in the mixed martial arts industry through years of anticompetitive tactics and engaged “in a scheme to acquire and maintain monopsony power in the market for elite professional MMA fighter services.”
Read UFC Reaches $375M Settlement in Le v. Zuffa Antitrust Lawsuit.