Braves Owner Liberty Media has "taken steps toward completing its plan to issue stock in the team, including disclosing some financial details that sports franchises typically guard closely," according to Tim Tucker of the ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION. Liberty, which announced in November that it would "create a 'tracking stock' to allow investors and baseball fans to buy and sell shares in the Braves separate from the rest of the Colorado-based conglomerate, expects the stock to begin trading on the Nasdaq exchange by this spring." The move would "make the Braves one of the few sports franchises in the world with publicly traded shares." The tracking stock, called Liberty Braves Group, is "intended to reflect -- or 'track' -- the economic performance of the team and its stake in a mixed-use development, The Battery Atlanta," next to the new SunTrust Park. A document about the plan, filed this month by Liberty with the SEC, "showed a drop in revenue as the team struggled on the field the past two seasons." The filing also revealed that the Braves "would have shown a healthy profit during that period" if not for a $25M expense "for depreciation and amortization." Similarly, the document showed that the Braves had an operating loss of $47M in '14, but "most of that" -- $29M -- "also was from depreciation and amortization." Liberty reported that through Sept. 30, the Braves’ '15 revenue was $227M, down from $242M at the same point in '14. The company plans to report full-year results for '15 later this month. In all, the Braves "cut operating expenses" by $25M in the first nine months of last year, compared to the same period in '14. Also, Liberty intends to raise $200M "with a rights offering of additional Braves shares." That money "would be used largely to repay" $165M borrowed by the Braves from Liberty for the ballpark (ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION, 2/14).
ALL THAT YOU CAN'T LEAVE BEHIND: In Atlanta, J. Scott Trubey noted the Braves said they will "no longer contest" the location of the Hank Aaron statue at Turner Field. This clears the way for the statue "to stay behind when the team moves to Cobb County." However, the team said it will commission "a new statue for all baseball fans to see" at SunTrust Park. The Braves' announcement "comes two days after the Atlanta Fulton County Recreation Authority, which owns The Ted, said it had reached a deal with the ball club to keep the bronze, followed hours later by a statement by the Braves that said no deal had been reached." The two days of public bickering "encapsulated the testy relationship between the Braves and the team’s hometown of 50 years." The Braves play their final season at Turner Field this year and plan to open SunTrust Park for the '17 season (ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION, 2/13).
