The Gap Between Women's Sports Growth and the Stock Market

You can buy shares of Disney, Citigroup, or General Motors. You cannot buy shares of the WNBA, the NWSL, or the PWHL.

That is the gap nobody at a women's investment summit talks about.

The Women Business Collaborative is hosting its Women's Capital Summit in New York on October 6-7. The theme is "Where Capital Moves." The agenda covers women's sports, women's health, AI, and alternative capital. Capital matching sessions. 150 investors and 150 entrepreneurs. It's built to feel like the place where the women's investment boom becomes real.

The boom is real. Women's sports generated about $1 billion in rights-holder revenue in 2024. McKinsey projects $2.5 billion by 2030. The WNBA signed an 11-year media deal worth $200 million a year. The New York Liberty raised capital at a $450 million valuation in May 2025.

But try to buy into any of that from the stock market. You can't.

Leagues are private. Teams are privately held. The capital raising happens through private equity, celebrity groups, and accredited-investor vehicles. Mellody Hobson launched a private fund called Project Level just to invest in the sector. Even her firm's sports portfolio -- Madison Square Garden, Manchester United -- is dominated by men's teams.

The question is not whether women's sports is a growth story. The question is whether there is a publicly traded vehicle that captures it. And the answer is basically no.

There is one fund that has gotten attention for bridging the women-investment gap, though it has nothing to do with sports. The Hypatia Women CEO ETF (WCEO) tracks companies led by female CEOs. It launched in January 2023 with about $1 million. It is now at roughly $11.7 million in market value and up about 20% year-to-date through August, outpacing the S&P 500. The fund hit an all-time high of $40.14.

But look at what WCEO actually holds. Its top 10 holdings make up only 14.4% of the fund. There are 163 positions total. AMD, led by Lisa Su, is the largest individual holding by market value. Citigroup, led by Jane Fraser. General Motors, led by Mary Barra.

None of these have anything to do with women's sports. WCEO is a play on female leadership, not on the women's economy. Patricia Lizarraga says women CEOs turn around struggling companies. That may well be true. But it's a different thesis from investing in women's sports or women-led businesses.

So what can an ordinary investor actually do if they believe in the growth here?

The exposure is indirect. Disney holds WNBA and NWSL broadcast rights through ESPN and also owns Fanatics -- the official merchandise maker for most major leagues -- after acquiring it in 2023 for $8.5 billion. Disney doubled its WNBA All-Star ad revenue for a second year. But women's sports is a rounding error in Disney's financials. The stock is down about 9% over the past year. Ally Financial is the WNBA's official banking partner, but the sponsorship is marketing spend, not a profit center.

The structural reason for this gap is simple. Women's sports teams do not generate enough revenue yet to justify public listing. The WNBA's $200 million annual media deal sounds like a lot until you divide it by 16 teams and subtract player salaries, arena costs, and operations. Most teams still lose money. Private capital is patient in a way public markets are not.

There's also a numbers problem. Only 11% of Fortune 500 companies have women CEOs. WCEO works because it's a small-cap fund -- the universe of eligible companies is narrow enough that equal-weighting does not dilute the signal. If the fund grew to billions, it would have to either stretch its criteria or become a concentrated bet on a handful of names. The current size of $11.7 million is less a testament to demand and more evidence of how small the pool still is.

What this means for an investor. If you believe women's sports is going to grow -- and the revenue acceleration suggests it will -- the returns will flow to private owners first. League stakeholders. Team owners. Private equity sponsors. The public-market beneficiaries are the media companies, sponsors, and merchandise partners, and they'll capture the growth as a small improvement in margins, not as a standalone investment thesis.

The conversation at summits like this one is real. The enthusiasm is real. The question for investors is whether the enthusiasm can become something you actually own through a public market, or whether the opportunity stays private for the next decade.

The test is simple. Watch the Liberty's $450 million valuation. Watch WNBA team revenue as a percentage of their male counterpart teams. Watch whether any women's sports league, team, or sports technology company files for an IPO. Until one does, the gap between the story and the stock market is not going to close.