An update from the liquidator handling the sale of Sir Bradley Wiggins’ image rights as part of post-bankruptcy proceedings has confirmed a sale fell through, with them now leaning towards a “bulk sale”.

A statement of receipts and payments submitted to Companies House by liquidators shows that in the past year the trademarks “Bradley Wiggins”, “Wiggins” and “Wiggo”, were close to being sold to an “interested party”.

Bradley Wiggins Lee Valley velodrome 2025
Bradley Wiggins Lee Valley velodrome 2025 (Image Credit: Alex Whitehead/SWpix.com)

The trademarks are registered as part of the name and image rights owned by Wiggins Rights Limited, the trading company which both Sir Bradley and his ex-wife Catherine are directors of. Wiggins’ bankruptcy proceedings related to unpaid debts owed to loans made by him as the director of his company.

> Sir Bradley Wiggins’ unpaid debts double to almost £2 million, as five-time Olympic champion’s bankruptcy woes continue

However, the liquidator reports that “the sale to the interested party did not finalise and I am reassessing a potential bulk sale of the remaining trademarks.” The liquidator added that part of the trademark has since expired and that the remaining trademarks are due to expire in August 2032.

It is not clear what sort of valuation the trademarks would have attracted but the sale falling through will lengthen the liquidation process. The liquidators had previously reported that “the Liquidation will remain open until the Intellectual Property Rights have been sold and the Director’s Bankruptcy proceedings have been finalised”.

Bradley Wiggins and Mark Cavendish, 2012 Tour de France
Bradley Wiggins and Mark Cavendish, 2012 Tour de France (Image Credit: ASO)

“I estimate that this will take approximately twenty-four months and once resolved the Liquidation will be finalised and our files will be closed,” an update posted on Companies House states.

Sir Bradley’s lawyer had previously told media that bankruptcy proceedings against the 2012 Tour de France champion meant he was sofa-surfing and “doesn’t have a penny”. But in a subsequent interview with his friend Lance Armstrong, Wiggins described the sofa-surfing reports as “sensationalism” and his financial issues as a “mess” that included investing hundreds of thousands of pounds into his own holding companies and “getting ripped off left, right, and centre by the people looking after me, accountants as well.”

Since then, as part of the promotional tour for his latest biography, Wiggins has also opened up about his cocaine addiction, and the trauma from sexual abuse that he was a victim of as a child and suppressed throughout his professional career.

> “I was doing shitloads of cocaine”: Bradley Wiggins says he became a “functioning addict” during post-retirement struggles

In the above interview, given in May, he said that his financial situation is “all resolved now” and it “has all turned around” in the last eight months.”