Cadillac’s first Formula 1 race weekend under a new team principal began with a conspicuous absence. Marcin Budkowski took charge of the garage at Zandvoort on Thursday, while the executive who runs the operation, Dan Towriss, was on the other side of the Atlantic at an IndyCar race in Washington DC. The questions circulating in the paddock were not about the car, the drivers or the upgrades. They were about the balance sheet — and about a Cadillac F1 sale that the team’s ownership group insists is not going to happen.
Why a Cadillac F1 sale is being discussed at all
The speculation traces back to one man. Mark Walter is chief executive of TWG, the company that operates General Motors’ Formula 1 entry, and he is under scrutiny from authorities in the United States. According to a report by Motorsport.com, the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission are examining an alleged fraud and cover-up scheme involving the management of funds at his insurance businesses Delaware Life, Clear Spring and EquiTrust, centred on a network of undisclosed “self-loans” reportedly running to between $16 billion and $20 billion.
Those are allegations under investigation rather than findings, and nothing has been tested in court. What has moved, however, is Walter’s portfolio. He sold his stake in the NBA’s Los Angeles Lakers barely a year after buying it, and reports in the United States suggest he has been weighing up sales of holdings in other sports ventures — Chelsea, the Los Angeles Dodgers, Andretti Global and Cadillac’s Formula 1 team among them — in order to raise liquidity while the investigation runs.
What Cadillac has actually said
On Thursday at the Dutch Grand Prix, the team moved to shut the story down, stating plainly that it is not up for sale. The Race and GPFans carried the same denial. It is a firm line, and a necessary one for an organisation that spent years persuading Formula 1 to let it in.
Towriss, meanwhile, was not at Zandvoort for the first grand prix of the Budkowski era. He was with Andretti at the IndyCar round in Washington DC, an event attended by US President Donald Trump. For a team chief executive, missing your new team principal’s debut weekend is a choice that invites interpretation, whatever the reasoning behind it.
Why ownership certainty matters so much in year one
Cadillac is on the grid because of TWG. The company bought Michael Andretti’s stake in the Andretti operation in 2024, and that change of control was the move that finally unlocked approval from the FIA, Formula 1 and the existing teams for an 11th entry in 2026. Ownership was the mechanism that got the project through the door, which is precisely why questions about ownership land harder here than they would at an established team.
The sporting side is only just finding its feet. Sergio Pérez and Valtteri Bottas are running Ferrari power in a first-season car, and the team has already changed its leadership once, with Graeme Lowdon replaced by Budkowski before the season is out. None of that is unusual for a start-up. All of it becomes considerably harder if the people paying for it are distracted.
The wider context is that money is still flowing towards Formula 1 rather than away from it. Aston Martin spent this week welcoming a new investor, with Woody Johnson taking a minority stake in the Silverstone team. Grid slots are appreciating assets, and Cadillac’s is the newest of the lot.
That is the awkward part of any denial. A team nobody wants to sell is also a team that would attract buyers the moment it was offered, which guarantees the question keeps being asked. Cadillac’s answer this weekend has to come on track, while its chief executive fields a rather different set of questions several thousand miles away.
