Mark Shapiro Says TKO Will 'Monitor The Situation' Ahead Of WWE's Saudi Arabia Return

TKO President Mark Shapiro has discussed if the current situation in the Middle East will affect WWE events in Saudi Arabia. 

Shapiro was asked on Yahoo Finance's "Power Players with Brian Sozzi" podcast about how the current turmoil in the Middle East could affect WWE and WrestleMania, which heads to Saudi Arabia next year. He pointed out that WWE doesn't have any events in Saudi Arabia until the end of June, implying that there is still time to see how things unfold.

"Yeah, you know, I'll tell you, I think the market has overreacted a little bit in terms of — don't get me wrong, Middle East what's going on isn't good for anybody or any business, I want to be clear about that, more importantly, for humanity. [But] We're not like F1. We don't have a lot of events at this time right now that would be impacted changed or moved or altered because of what's going on over there. We have an event at the end of June. That's our next event. We had Royal Rumble in January for WWE. We've got another event at the end of June. We have another UFC fight planned in the Middle East that will be actually by the time this airs we'll have already been announced."

Shapiro added that TKO is monitoring the situation and will change the venue if circumstances do not improve.

"So, all systems go, but you know, as you'd expect, we're going to monitor the situation, and if we have to make a move or to have a schedule change, we will do the right thing by our audience and more importantly, by global affairs."

He outlined how TKO plans to host more events in Saudi Arabia to grow the following in the region, before WrestleMania heads to the country next year. Night of Champions, the next WWE event set to take place in the Middle Eastern country on June 27, although reports suggest that WWE may not hold a "Raw" or "SmackDown" around Night of Champions.