Yes, he is a billionaire. But most of his assets are tied up in Bills (Worth 2+ Billion) Sabres (500 million). He also holds lots of debt, I think he is struggling on the liquid portion of things. That is why he laid off 30+ people. It saves him millions over the course of the next year or so while COVID gets figured out.
I didn't know you were the Pegula's accountant.
They Pegula's are fine.
They just are trying to run a sports franchise like a business instead of a passion project. Football that isn't an issue as its instantly profitable. Hockey side will NEVER be profitable unless the team is taking deep runs into the playoffs yearly.
He spent what, 1.4B on the bills and 200M on the Sabres. The bills are, at a minimum, revenue neutral.
He's probably lost an additional 100M on the Sabres since purchasing and spent probably another 100M buying up other properties in the PSE portfolio.
So, if you assume 2B is tied up...that leaves him with 3B in other investments.
And I'm sure he did take a bath on fracking. But he didn't take a 3B bath.
Money wise, I'm sure they are fine. Are assets tied up? Sure.
Are the Pegula's struggling for money? Absolutely not.
The cuts, simply stated, are them being greedy assholes. Let's do some math here.
The Pegula's laid off 22 people. Let's just assume, on average (and I think i'm being generous here), the employees fired make on average 200k a year and cost the team 250k after benefits.
250k x 22 = 5.5M a year. Now, before this is all said and done, (let's say 4 months from now when the 2021 season ramps up), PSE will have to rehire, let's say 80% of those positions (the coaching staff in rochester, etc).
long term, they save 1.1M a year. However, the firings were about the 4 months those they fired were 100% idle. There was no AHL coaching, no professional scouting, no amateur scouting, just sitting around running meetings. 4 months without those positions saves PSE 1.8-ish M.
MOST NHL owners are simply eating the loss there. And they see scouting as the infrastructure of the team. The Pegula's are now seeing it and themselves personally spending 1.8M for people to sit around. Which is the disturbing part.
The Sabres are no longer a fun thing for the Pegula's. They are a non profitable business....so, it's going to be treated as such.