Bruce Buck

Lawyer and chairman of Chelsea Football Club

Bruce Buck
Buck in 2008

Chairman of Chelsea Football Club
In office March 2004 – 20 June 2022
Preceded by	Ken Bates
Succeeded by	Todd Boehly

Personal details
Born	March 1946 (age 78) New York, United States
Alma mater	Colgate University B.A. Columbia Law School J.D.
Profession	Lawyer

Bruce Michael Buck (born March 1946) is an American lawyer and founding managing partner of the London office of law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. He was also the Chairman of Chelsea Football Club from 2004 until 2022.^[1] His practice areas are European mergers and acquisitions, project finance and capital markets.

Early life and education

Buck received a bachelor of the arts degree from Colgate University and a Juris Doctor degree from Columbia Law School.^[2]^[3]

Law career

Bruce Buck has been practising law in Europe since 1983. He left New York for England in 1983 for a “standard tour of duty” of two or three years with his previous law firm White & Case. Five years later he was headhunted by M&A specialists Skadden Arps to develop the firm's European practice from scratch and has stayed on ever since.^[4]

As the partner in charge of Skadden's European offices, his work includes a broad range of transactions in the capital markets area.^[5] Buck represents both European and non-European clients in a full range of crossborder financing transactions, generally in connection with equity offerings or high-yield and other debt financings.

Chelsea F.C.

Buck's involvement with Chelsea began through his position as European head of the American law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom.^[6] Skadden Arps specialises in mergers, acquisitions and capital market transactions, and Buck had personally done legal work on a number of acquisitions for the Russian company Siberian Oil (Sibneft), through which he came to advise Russian-Israeli billionaire Roman Abramovich, formerly the majority shareholder in Sibneft.^[5]

The £140 million acquisition of all of the outstanding shares of the London Stock Exchange-listed company Chelsea Village plc was his first experience of taking over a football club.

Buck remained in his role, despite the ownership change at Chelsea in May 2022.^[7] This changed on 20 June 2022, when the club announced that he would be stepping down from his role effective 30 June, although he would continue to work for the club as a Senior Advisor.^[8] He was succeeded by club co-owner Todd Boehly as chairman.^[9]

Personal life

Buck has a wife and three sons. He took an interest in football after moving to London in the 1980s, and became a season ticket holder to Chelsea in 1991.^[10]

References

^ An American Blueprint for success The Telegraph, 28 January 2006
^ "Preston Robert Tisch Institute for Global Sport – Advisory Board". Retrieved 20 February 2024.
^ "Bruce Buck".
^ "Bruce Buck Securities lawyer and Chelsea chairman". Times online. Archived from the original on 11 June 2011. Retrieved 28 February 2010. Times Online, 21 April 2008
^ ^a ^b Spence, Alex (9 October 2023). "Business big shot: Bruce Buck, Partner in Skadden".
^ A day in the life of...Bruce Buck, 28 January 2006
^ "Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck set to remain in role after club sale". BBC Sport. 9 May 2022.
^ "Bruce Buck to step down as Chairman of Chelsea Football Club | Official Site | Chelsea Football Club". ChelseaFC. Retrieved 20 June 2022.
^ "Todd Boehly the new Chelsea chairman as Marina Granovskaia exits in shakeup". the Guardian. 22 June 2022. Retrieved 25 January 2023.
^ "A day in the life of...Bruce Buck".