Man United's New Stadium To Seat 100K: Will It Boost Stock? - Manchester United (NYSE:MANU)

One of the most famous lines in a sports movie of all time is the quote "If you build it, he will come" in "Field of Dreams."

Manchester United MANU will be hoping that if they build their new stadium, fans come, including one of their richest fans: billionaire Elon Musk.

What Happened: Musk joked about buying Manchester United several years ago. He ultimately stayed out of the bidding process. Sir Jim Ratcliffe went on to acquire a minority stake in the English Premier League team.

"Although, if it were any team, it would be Man U. They were my fav team as a kid," Musk tweeted previously about the rumors.

Musk, like many soccer fans, calls Manchester United his favorite team. This strong fandom of English fans and fans around the world sees thousands of fans travel to the team's Old Trafford stadium each home game to fill the stands.

On Tuesday, Manchester United announced plans to leave Old Trafford, which has been the team's home since 1910, for a new larger stadium.

The new stadium would be constructed in the existing location of Old Trafford. It’s expected to have a capacity of 100,000. That’s significantly higher than the nearly 76,000 for the current stadium, as reported by ESPN.

The team has been working on plans to either redevelop the existing stadium or build a new one. The last expansion done on Old Trafford was in 2006.

"Today marks the start of an incredibly exciting journey to the delivery of what will be the world's greatest football stadium, at the centre of a regenerated Old Trafford," Ratcliffe said. "Our current stadium has served us brilliantly for the past 115 years, but it has fallen behind the best arenas in world sport."

Along with the new stadium, a redevelopment of the area, including the construction of 17,000 new homes, will take place.

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Why It's Important: The new stadium would become the largest in the United Kingdom by capacity. It would also surpass the current leader Wembley, which seats around 90,000 people.

The new stadium could help Manchester United better compete for top events with Wembley being the home of the England national soccer team and Tottenham Hotspur Stadium hosting NFL games.

With capacity of 100,000, the stadium will be among the largest in the world, trailing only Camp Nou, home of Barcelona, among soccer specific stadiums. Camp Nou is expected to seat around 105,000 when current work is done.

Tuesday's announcement comes after United fans protested the current club ownership's decision to cut costs and raise ticket prices despite minimal team success.

Ratcliffe's ownership stake and investment in the club was viewed as a potential turnaround of the storied club that has fallen on tough times. Fans have pushed for a sale of the team by the Glazer family, who also own the NFL's Tampa Bay Buccaneers, for years.

Manchester United currently sits in 14^th place of the 20 English Premier League teams for the 2024-2025 season. It has a record of 9 wins, 7 draws and 12 losses. The team has struggled in recent years with its last league title coming in 2012-2013.

The top four teams in the league automatically qualify for the prestigious Champions League tournament, which brings in additional team revenue, home matches and broadcast revenue opportunities. Manchester United has qualified for the Champions League less frequently than in the past over the last several years.

The publicly traded team recently reported second-quarter revenue that was down 12% year-over-year. Broadcasting revenue was a big reason why, with match day revenue that includes ticketing up 9.2% year-over-year.

The new stadium could add around 32% more seats and help boost matchday revenue.

The big question will be if the team could be more competitive in the English Premier League and get back into the Champions League. A massive stadium is nice, but the team winning could mean more for the financials.

MANU Price Action: Manchester United stock trades at $13.61 versus a 52-week trading range of $13.50 to $18.42. The stock is down 19.9% year-to-date in 2025 and down 4.2% over the last year.

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