The SEC in its first fiscal year with Missouri and Texas A&M as conference members "raised its total revenue" by more than $41M to $314.5M, according to tax filings cited by Steve Berkowitz of USA TODAY. SEC Commissioner Mike Slive's base compensation for the '12 calendar year "increased by just over $230,000" to nearly $1.2M. That 25% raise "helped offset the absence of bonus compensation" in '12 for Slive. But even with the conference's "overall revenue increase, it reported losing money for the fiscal year that ended Aug. 31, 2013." Its return listed $317.9M in "total expenses," resulting in a nearly $3.4M "deficit for the year -- an amount it covered from accumulated net assets" that had totaled more than $46M as of Aug. 31, 2012. Nearly all of the SEC's expenses "came in the form of distributions to the schools -- and the distributions to Missouri and Texas A&M showed why they departed the Big 12 Conference." Those two schools each received about $19.5M in their "first cuts of the SEC's primary pool of shared revenue, a dramatic increase in the amounts they received from their last full shares of the Big 12's primary revenue pool" in '10-11. The SEC's other 12 schools received around $21M apiece. According to Big 12 tax records, Missouri got $12.5M from the conference in '10-11 and Texas A&M $12.2M. The 15% jump in total conference revenue still left the SEC "just shy of what the Big Ten reported as its total revenue" for the tax year that ended June 30, 2012 -- $315.5M. However, the SEC's "revenue surge continued to increase the financial pressure on the other conferences" (USATODAY.com, 4/9).
