Take the Dodgers deal. To create Guggenheim Baseball Management, the entity that bought the baseball team, Walter assembled former Los Angeles Laker Johnson, Guggenheim’s then-president and co-founder Todd Boehly and Texas oil tycoon Bobby Patton. Minerd, Schwartz and Lawson-Johnston weren’t named as partners. (Spokesmen for Johnson and Patton declined to comment.) The transaction came under fire when Guggenheim and three insurance affiliates were sued by clients for conflict of interest.

The lawsuit claimed that Guggenheim executives saddled the insurers with risky, illiquid assets, including the Dodgers, and that they inflated assets to get the deal done. The 105-page suit, filed in Chicago federal court, was voluntarily dismissed within 24 hours. It was withdrawn and never refiled “because it was recognized that the allegations had no merit,” Sitrick said.

The next year, in an unrelated matter, Guggenheim agreed to pay $20 million, without admitting wrongdoing, to settle claims with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The issue centered on a $50 million loan that a senior Guggenheim executive had received from a client, which might have raised conflicts of interest if the firm subsequently favored that client.

The executive, according to four people familiar with the matter, was Boehly. The client was Michael Milken, the one-time junk bond king, the people said. Spokesmen for Boehly and Milken declined to comment.

Boehly’s Exit

Boehly, 44, soon left Guggenheim to start a private investment firm, Eldridge Industries. Walter has told at least one business associate that he, too, would like to reach for something bigger.

He’s certainly been busy. In 2013, he and his wife, Kimbra, bought White Oak Plantation, a 7,400-acre Florida refuge for rhinos, giraffes and other animals. In 2016, Boehly divested his stake in another insurance affiliate, Delaware Life Insurance Co., with $37 billion in assets, and handed control to Walter. Delaware Life has since been rebranded as Group One Thousand One. Daniel Towriss, Guggenheim’s insurance expert, was named CEO in September.

Private Investment

That’s not all. In January, Walter announced plans to open a $1 billion “private-investment platform” with Frank McCourt, the previous owner of the Dodgers. And in May, he joined a partnership that paid $85 million for entertainment mogul David Geffen’s seaside estate in Malibu, California.

In July, Guggenheim brought in Jerry Miller, a former Deutsche Bank AG executive, to help broker peace between factions. Late last month, it announced it was selling its exchange-traded funds business for $1.2 billion, which will give the firm additional capital.