Floyd Mayweather, Jr. of the U.S. yells out to the crowd after defeating Manny Pacquiao of the Philippines in their welterweight WBO, WBC and WBA (Super) title fight in Las Vegas, Nevada, May 2, 2015. (Photo : REUTERS)
LAS VEGAS -- Undefeated pound-for-pound king Floyd "Money" Mayweather may have never lost a fight in the ring, but he doesn't seem to have a problem giving up world title belts either.
In a statement released by the World Boxing Organization (WBO) on Monday, the organization announced officially that it was stripping Mayweather of the 147-pound belt he had won by defeating rival Manny "Pacman" Pacquiao last May.
Following his victory over Pacquiao, Mayweather, at the post-fight press conference, expressed his interest to vacate all of his title belts to allow younger fighters to vie for championships that he currently holds.
Mayweather is recognized as the WBO, WBA and WBC welterweight champion of the world. He holds an unblemished record of 48 wins including 26 knockouts that spans an illustrious 19 year career.
Given Mayweather's expressed interest to relinquish his titles, the WBO then proceeded to sanction a bout between Timothy Bradley and Jesse Vargas which took place last June 27. The bout was proposed to crown a new welterweight champion.
As the Bradley-Vargas fight quickly approached, Mayweather at the time had not yet vacated his WBO belt as was originally planned.
Bradley defeated Vargas by unanimous decision and instead became the "interim" WBO welterweight champion.
Apart from failing to officially relinquish his WBO title, Mayweather also failed to meet a 4:30 p.m. ET deadline last Friday to pay the $200,000 sanctioning fee ordered by the WBO for the Pacquiao bout.
As a result of this, the organization has decided to officially strip Mayweather of the WBO welterweight title and he will no longer be recognized as its champion.
Bradley is expected to be recognized as the "regular" WBO welterweight champion as soon as matters are finalized.
"In the present case, Mr. Mayweather, Jr. failed to pay the $200,000 fee required of him as a participant of a WBO World Championship Contest," the WBO statement read.
Section 16 of WBO regulations stipulates that the organization shall be paid a "sanction fee" by both champion and challenger of a rate "equal to 3 percent of their purses with a minimum of $1,000 and a maximum of $200,000 per boxer."
"The WBO World Championship Committee is allowed no other alternative but to cease to recognize Mr. Floyd Mayweather, Jr. as the WBO Welterweight Champion of the World and vacate his title, for failing to comply with our WBO Regulations of World Championship Contests.
"This is the final decision of the WBO World Championship Committee."
Last May 2 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, Mayweather and Pacquiao headlined what ended up becoming the richest fight in boxing history.
The bout shattered a myriad of financial records including the highest number of pay-per-view buys as well as the largest live gate receipt for a boxing event.
