An Atlanta Braves IPO???

[Zanarkand A East]

Buying stock in a team that's slashing payroll and with historically low attendance. Seems legit.

[Hokiehaven]

Originally Posted by oldschoolChevy

You're right. They're owned by the citizens of Green Bay or something like that. But they do have stock, no clue how that works but I'm sure of that. I've seen there stock for sale online before. Outside of them I don't think any pro team in the US does it

Packers stock has no value, as it's just basically a fundraiser for the team and they have enough fans to do such a thing and basically it assures they'll never move. Presume this will be more like a real stock.

[AnsleyPark]

Originally Posted by Hokiehaven

Packers stock has no value, as it's just basically a fundraiser for the team and they have enough fans to do such a thing and basically it assures they'll never move. Presume this will be more like a real stock.

It's a tracking stock. The stockholders have no equity (ownership) of the team. Thus, the stockholders have no vote in matters. Perhaps it would be "cool" to own a few shares and frame your certificate and hang it on the wall. However, I cannot imagine that folks would buy this paper as a legitimate investment.

[Hokiehaven]

Is there a financial benefit, cause there is none with GB.

[DawgPark]

Originally Posted by AnsleyPark

It's a tracking stock. The stockholders have no equity (ownership) of the team. Thus, the stockholders have no vote in matters. Perhaps it would be "cool" to own a few shares and frame your certificate and hang it on the wall. However, I cannot imagine that folks would buy this paper as a legitimate investment.

Correct. This has nothing to do w/ the Braves, Cobb County, or any other garbage the usual suspects on this board want to make it out to be.

Liberty is creating tracking stocks for each of its 3 divisions:
- Sirius XM
- Live Nation Entertainment
- Atlanta Braves

It could, however, be a precursor step to Liberty spinning the Braves off as a separate entity from Liberty Media Corp, i.e. selling them to a new owner.

[AnsleyPark]

Originally Posted by Hokiehaven

Is there a financial benefit, cause there is none with GB.

If the Braves begin to improve economically, then the stock should theoretically appreciate in value. Given that they have little room to perform worse and a lot of room to perform better, I would think that the stock will appreciate over time. But given it's lack of equity ownership, I don't really think that serious investors will consider this issue a buy. Further, I seriously doubt that Liberty will ever declare a dividend on the stock.

[noah]

They believe the market undervalues their assets so they are creating the different tracking stocks to try to increase value and highlight their worth. If the Braves increase in value like every other sports team has in the last ten years then absolutely the shareholders will earn very nice returns.

The Braves went from $424 million in 2002 to 1.15 billion in 2015.

http://www.statista.com/statistics/1...es-since-2006/

[cqholt]

Originally Posted by noah

They believe the market undervalues their assets so they are creating the different tracking stocks to try to increase value and highlight their worth. If the Braves increase in value like every other sports team has in the last ten years then absolutely the shareholders will earn very nice returns.

The Braves went from $424 million in 2002 to 1.15 billion in 2015.

• MLB Atlanta Braves franchise value 2002-2015 | Statistic

Having a new stadium, partially paid for by the citizens won't hurt the bottom line either.

[LTCM]

Liberty Media is a leader in how to avoid taxes, and this move is just one more example.

Back in 2007, they had a bunch of Time Warner stock which they had owned for a long time. If they had sold it, they would have faced a huge tax bill on the gains. At the same time, Time Warner wanted to buy back billions of dollars of their own stock. Liberty and Time Warner worked out a deal where Liberty Media gave TONS of the Time Warner stock they owned back to Time Warner. In exchange, Liberty Media got the Braves, close to a $1 billion, and some magazines. Tax bill = $0, even though they essentially sold their Time Warner stock which had large gains.

That's why they cannot sell the Braves outright. Not only would they owe tax on the increase in value of the Braves since 2007, they'd owe taxes on the Time Warner stock gains which got rolled into their cost basis for the team (and the other parts).

So what do you do? You monetize the capital you have invested in the Braves without selling them. Create the tracking stock, have the new entity loan you millions of dollars, and sell the shares of the new tracking entity. Bammm, you now have taken your money out of the Braves without selling, and thus no taxes due.

It's brilliant. The Liberty Media finance team deserves a pat on the back!

[jsvh]

Stock plan opens window to Braves