LONDON – It’s no secret that NBA commissioner Adam Silver has been targeting massive financial investments from Middle Eastern countries to help start his planned European basketball league.

On Saturday, Silver took it further, saying that the potentially heavy involvement of sovereign wealth funds in NBA Europe could translate into an eventual rule change regarding how much those countries can invest in the NBA.

“It may be that over time there are practices that we learn from in Europe that will then work in the U.S.,” Silver said in London during a roundtable discussion with European-based reporters, ahead of Sunday’s NBA Game between the Orlando Magic and Memphis Grizzlies.

“It means looking at this opportunity from scratch here in Europe, we are open to different kinds of investors, as principal investors, that aren’t currently allowed in the U.S.,” Silver said.

Currently, NBA rules restrict sovereign wealth funds from owning greater than 20 percent of any of the league’s 30 teams. But for years, the league has nurtured relationships with controlling rulers, governments and investment funds from the Middle East, through numerous exhibition games both for NBA teams and USA Basketball in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. A new European league could be the way for those investors to eventually break through in the American game.

There have already been steps taken in that direction. In 2023, the Qatari Investment Authority purchased a 5 percent stake in Monumental Sports, the parent company of the Washington Wizards, and the Qatari fund increased its stake in Monumental last year. Additionally, when Mark Walter purchased the Lakers for $10 billion last year through his holding company, TWG Global, the deal came just two months after TWG Capital received a $10 billion investment from Mubadala Capital, the asset management department of Abu Dhabi’s largest sovereign wealth fund. Abu Dhabi’s tourism department, “Experience Abu Dhabi,” became a title sponsor of the New York Knicks last season.

Silver’s NBA Europe is slated to have anchor teams in London, Paris, Rome, Milan, Berlin, Munich, Barcelona, Madrid, Athens, Istanbul, Manchester and Lyon. Earlier Saturday, The Athletic reported that Alba Berlin, a locally owned team, was a frontrunner to join Silver’s new league, with the help of new, as-of-yet unnamed investment partners.

Of the other 11 cities, there are obvious opportunities for team ownership by a Middle Eastern fund in at least three cities — London, Paris and Manchester.

In the U.K., Manchester City’s multi-billion-dollar soccer franchise is owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan through the Abu Dhabi United Group out of the United Arab Emirates. The chairman of Manchester City is another Emirate, Khaldoon Al Mubarak, whose brother, Mohamed Khalifa Al Mubarak, runs the Abu Dhabi Department of Culture and Tourism. Mohamed Khalifa Al Mubarak is a business partner of New York Knicks owner James Dolan. London has a pro team, the London Lions, but it is possible the NBA seeks deep-pocketed investors from established soccer teams in the city, or, perhaps, a sovereign fund.

In Paris, a EuroLeague team exists, run by former NBA team executive David Kahn, but the NBA is seeking a partnership with Qatari authorities that own soccer giant Paris Saint-Germain. Those three cities might also need new arenas built for NBA Europe teams, on top of the buy-in for NBA Europe teams, which is expected to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, if not higher.

“We’re talking to families that currently invest in sports,” Silver said. “In addition to talking to wealth funds, there’s more traditional investment funds that have had some experience investing in sports and then some just more traditional, home private equity funds that see sports as an asset class.

“So just to be clear, we are open to different forms of capital.”

Silver, his chief deputy Mark Tatum and Andreas Zagklis, chief executive for FIBA, the international governing body for basketball and the NBA’s partner in Europe, will continue meeting with potential investors and media rights holders in London past Sunday’s game between the Magic and Grizzlies.