Seattle Seahawks linebacker Bobby Wagner revealed an exciting opportunity for fans to tap into the stock market on Wednesday.
CNBC reported the National Football League (NFL) player has become an equity holder in Public.com, a social investing platform that allows individuals to invest in companies commission-free. In addition, Public promotes financial literacy by allowing users to follow domain authorities and familiar investors.
Since the company’s inception in 2019, it has raised $310 million from investors including Accel, Greycroft, and high-profile celebrities like Will Smith and J.J Smith. While the terms of the linebacker’s agreement have not yet been disclosed, he did share the incentive for the recent venture.
“I want people to understand how money works and how people invest,” Wagner stated in an interview with CNBC on Tuesday. “You can have conversations with people to get their thoughts on why they are investing in certain things.”
The social investment platform — reportedly privately valued at $1.2 billion — will give incoming fans free stocks after creating an account. According to CNBC, Public co-CEO Leif Abraham also said: “the company has more than 1 million users, and it wants to ‘scale education around the stock market.'”
Wagner will be placed on the advisory board for One Team, a Public’s program to educate NCAA student-athletes on how to profit off their name, image, and likeness (NIL). A timely initiative following The Supreme Courts’ decision to compensate student-athletes, AfroTech previously reported. The NFL player wants students to take initiative and not rely on other parties to dictate their financial decisions. He wants players to “get out of the mindset of giving it to someone else and letting them do the investing. Instead, gain some knowledge so you can have a conversation versus being told what to do,” he said to CNBC.
This deal comes just one year after the pro athlete became an investor for Fuse Venture Partners fulfilling the athlete’s goal to partake in smart financial investments.
“I’m still learning what stocks are good to invest in, how long you should hold on to them, versus when you should sell them. So this partnership is a platform for me to learn as well,” Wagner said, according to CNBC.
CNBC also reports Wagner went from linebacker to venture partner alongside former Microsoft executive John Connors and former Amazon executive Satbir Khanuja when he joined Fuse Venture Partners in 2020. Now, only time will tell if his recent investment will be a win for Wagner’s portfolio.
