Happy Monday.

Was speaking with a friend recently about one of the biggest problems with sports gambling: the many variables tied to a single game’s outcome.

In comes Agentiq Sports with a bold proposal… but you’ll just have to read the rest in today’s article. 👀

In case you missed it: we released our playbook on how we build great events on Thursday. Inside, you’ll see all our advice on how we’ve scaled to everything from intimate dinners to 1000-person-events.

Ethan and Arek 🦄

Agentiq lets fans invest in professional athletes by buying securities tied to their future on-field earnings. Players receive an upfront payment and brand advisory support in exchange for a defined share of qualifying income. Fans buy units in individual player offerings and may receive distributions as that income comes in. Its first five offerings are tied to baseball players, including Washington Nationals prospect Ronny Cruz and Esmerlyn Valdez, who made his MLB debut with the Pittsburgh Pirates in May 2026.

Check it out: agentiqsports.com

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Each athlete has a separate offering. The player receives money upfront and brand advisory support in exchange for giving their “series” a fixed share of qualifying future on-field earnings. Fans choose a player and buy units in that player's series, which means they buy a share of the investment tied to that player's earnings. Unit prices vary by player. In its first five offerings, they have ranged from $5.10 to $35.30.

When an athlete receives income covered by the agreement, the agreed percentage goes to their series. After covering expenses and setting aside reserves, any remaining cash can be distributed to investors based on how many units they own. Endorsements and other off-field income generally aren't included, and there is no public market to resell units yet.

The offerings are qualified under SEC Regulation A, Tier 2, and sales are handled through a FINRA-member broker-dealer. The SEC oversees the securities offering, while FINRA oversees the broker-dealer involved in the sales.

Both of Agentiq’s founders come with backgrounds as athletes. Zach Kurtz played Division I baseball at the University of Richmond before working at Catch, a fintech startup, and founding LV Lumber, a baseball equipment company used by professional players. His co-founder, Reuben Abraham, worked at Pave and NerdWallet and captained the UAE U-19 cricket team.

They noticed how team valuations were climbing, player salaries were reaching new highs, and private firms were finding ways to invest in athletes' future earnings. However, the fans who helped fuel that growth had no way to participate themselves. Kurtz had heard concerns about the terms of some of those agreements and saw an opportunity to build something more transparent, with fans involved directly.

Baseball was a natural place to start, but the decision went beyond the founders' backgrounds. Players can spend years in the minor leagues before reaching major-league salaries, and free agency takes years even after they make it to the majors. Kurtz estimated that more than 10% of major-league rosters had already signed similar agreements, giving the founders reason to believe they were building on an existing market rather than trying to create one.

Sports fans are already used to putting money behind their opinions, whether that means buying a prospect's cards or betting on a game. Agentiq gives them a way to back a player's career instead. Investors buy a share of the athlete's future on-field earnings, which sounds simple enough until you look at what the contract covers. It offers a chance to share in some of the financial upside as a player's career takes off.

In baseball, players can spend years in the minors before they earn a major-league salary, and even players who make it to the MLB have a long road to free agency. An upfront payment helps fund a player's development during those years, while baseball's extensive performance data gives Agentiq more to work with when estimating future earnings. That gives investors the chance to back a player early and share in the financial upside as their career develops.

The contracts also make a bigger difference than the headline idea suggests. Ronny Cruz, a shortstop in the Washington Nationals’ minor league system, has an agreement that includes qualifying minor league earnings. Esmerlyn Valdez, an outfielder who made his MLB debut with the Pittsburgh Pirates this year, has one that excludes them. Both agreements exclude endorsements and other off-field income. 

Agentiq's website compares average professional sports salaries with the S&P 500 since 2000, but league-wide salary growth doesn't guarantee what any one player will earn, since that depends on his career and the income covered by the agreement. That said, fans have the opportunity to invest in individual players they believe in and share in the earnings their careers generate.

As team valuations and player salaries have climbed, fans have had few ways to participate in the financial growth of the sports they love to follow. So Agentiq offers fans a way to back individual players as their careers develop while giving young athletes access to capital earlier in their careers.

The model has precedent: Fantex sold securities tied to athletes’ future earnings, but closed its retail trading platform in 2016 after trading volumes failed to take off. Agentiq's units are also long-term investments, with no public market for resale today. Still, the company says its first offerings were approaching six figures in proceeds after about two weeks, before it had fully ramped up marketing. If that early interest continues, Agentiq could give fans a more direct stake in the sports economy while offering athletes another way to fund their path to professional success.