Peter Thiel-backed Enhanced Games shares tumble 50%

Enhanced Group (ENHA), the public company behind the Peter Thiel-backed Enhanced Games, saw its shares fall about 50% on Tuesday after the brand’s single-night event on May 24 at Resorts World Las Vegas produced one unofficial world record and prompted heavy selling.

The event offered a $25 million prize purse and featured roughly 42 athletes. Company monitoring data released around the contest showed 91% of competitors tested positive for testosterone, 79% for human growth hormone and 62% for stimulants such as Adderall and modafinil.

Greek swimmer Kristian Gkolomeev recorded 20.81 seconds in the men’s 50-meter freestyle, edging the previous 20.88-second mark and earning a $1 million bonus. Sprinter Fred Kerley won the 100 meters in 9.97 seconds. Clean athletes, including Olympic gold medalist Hunter Armstrong, won three events outright.

Enhanced Group shares closed at $5.36 on Friday and opened near $2.67 on Tuesday, an intraday decline of about 50% that erased close to $800 million in market value. The company had listed this month at an approximately $1.2 billion valuation; market capitalization fell from about $981 million on May 7 to roughly $655 million after the sell-off.

One researcher criticized the spectacle, calling it “a steroid Olympics” and writing that organizers “promised to \”redefine human limits\” and put up $25M in prize money…the only thing they actually proved was how good the clean athletes already are.”

Investors and market commentators linked the share decline to a shortfall in on-stage performance versus pre-event claims and to the single live demonstration that failed to produce multiple record-breaking results. The company’s ability to stage further events will be observed against public-market appetite.

Enhanced Group has stated its events will test athletic performance with fewer drug restrictions than traditional sport. The May 24 debut and the market reaction have left questions about the competitive results and the company’s public-market case.