Gold’s Gym International Inc. is putting its gyms on the bankruptcy auction block, with bids starting at about $80 million, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. The company, which filed for bankruptcy last month after closing its gyms because of the coronavirus pandemic, had planned to sell its assets to TRT Holdings Inc., a holding company led by billionaire Robert Rowling that acquired a majority stake in Gold’s Gym in 2004. The proposed sale to TRT, which would be completed through a chapter 11 plan and not an auction, would have paid off the chain’s $51.3 million senior debt, its $20 million bankruptcy loan and transaction costs of up to $10 million. But the gym chain’s creditors asked for a “market check” after some interested parties came forward and expressed interest in making better offers for the assets. TRT will now serve as a stalking horse, or lead bidder, for the chain’s assets at a bankruptcy auction, with bids starting at “no less than” $80 million, according to papers filed Monday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Dallas.
