Major League Baseball is ending a 70-year relationship with trading card company Topps after signing a new partnership with a rival company.
The loss of the MLB partnership immediately scuttled a deal announced earlier this year that would have made Topps a publicly-traded company.
The special-purpose acquisition company Mudrick Capital Acquisition Corporation II said Friday that its agreement to merge with Topps to take the company public was terminated by mutual agreement after it found out that MLB and the league's players' union would not be renewing their respective agreements with The Topps Co. when they come up for renewal at the end of 2025 and 2022, respectively.
According to the Associated Press, ESPN obtained a memo it reported Thursday from the Major League Baseball Players Association that sports merchandise company Fanatics was creating a company, which is unnamed, that would become the exclusive licensee for baseball cards at the end of next year once its current licensing agreements expire.
Topps said by 2025, they expect to have made all its current licensed baseball products.
