Here at Venture, we’re big sports fans. It’s especially exciting for us when sports and finance intersect. That’s why we were particularly intrigued by the sale of the Los Angeles Lakers NBA team for $10 billion in June. The team has been owned by the Buss family since May 1979, when they purchased the Lakers for $67.5 million. The deal also included the Los Angeles Kings (an NHL team) and the Forum (the Lakers’ former home arena). The $10 billion price tag is the highest ever paid for a North American sports franchise, surpassing the $6.1 billion paid for the Boston Celtics in 2025 and the $6.05 billion paid for the NFL’s Washington Commanders in 2023. The Lakers are an iconic sports franchise, the winner of 17 N.B.A. titles, trailing only the Celtics who have 18 titles.

This enormous return over 46 years got us thinking about how this would compare to simply investing in the stock market for the same timeframe. We ran the numbers and were pleased to see that the results showed investing in the S&P 500 would have netted a slightly higher return. And it supports our long-held belief that owning equities for the long term produces solid, inflation-beating investment returns. Please note that this calculation excludes factors such as distributions the Buss family may have taken over the years, as well as the disposition of the Kings and the Forum. It also ignores taxes, though theoretically this would be a wash since team distributions and S&P dividends would be treated similarly.

Inflation over this same timeframe was 3.3% annualized (Consumer price index). Source for S&P 500 Index data: S&P 500 Historical Return Calculator [With Dividends] – Of Dollars And Data

Compound returns from owning equities have proven to be an automatic and powerful wealth builder—it’s not “Magic,” but simply tried and true common sense.

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Advisory services provided by Venture Visionary Partners, LLC (“VVP”). VVP and Of Dollars And Data are separate, nonaffiliated entities.