You Too Can Own a Baseball Team, Just Like a Billionaire

While fans sink their dollars into tickets, brews and burgers, becoming a part owner isn't as a safe a bet or glamorous as it might seem.
By Noah Zuss ,

Owning part of a sports franchise isn't just for billionaires anymore.

A new tracking stock issued by John Malone, the billionaire chairman of Liberty Media (LMCA) , will make it possible for society's 99% to have a chance to own a part of Major League Baseball's Atlanta Braves. Just like the rich guys.

In typically complex form, Liberty Media will issue common stock that will link the Liberty Braves Group to the subsidiary Braves Holding, which indirectly owns the Atlanta Braves. Liberty intends to trade the Liberty Braves Group Series A, B and C common stock under the symbols BATRA/B/K respectively.

Malone's move is ostensibly to "unlock" shareholder, which means make it easier for investors to know what Liberty Media owns. In addition to creating a tracking stock for Liberty Media's holding in the Atlanta Braves, it also issued stock related to its ownership position in Sirius XM. Liberty Media will continue to trade as owner of stakes in Live Nation Entertainment (LYV) - Get Report , Time Warner (TWX) and Viacom (VIAB) - Get Report .

The tracking stocks should help restore 10% to 15% of Liberty Media's value that has been buried over the last two years because investors didn't realize everything the company owned, said Macquarie media analyst Amy Yong.

The overwhelming majority of new investors to Liberty Braves, of course, won't ever sit in the owner's box, pal around at home plate before the game begins or even high-five their favorite players in the style of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. Nonetheless, they can aspire to such diversions.

The Braves will join three other U.S.-based sports franchises that are publicly traded, led by the New York Knicks and Rangers, assets held by Madison Square Garden (MSG) - Get Report . The other is the Green Bay Packers, which last issued common stock in 2012. The Packers equity, though, it pays no dividends, makes no earnings, can't be traded and isn't protected by securities laws.

No wonder that the The Wall Street Journal wonder in 2012 whether it was the worst stock traded on either the New York Stock Exchange or the Nasdaq. And that includes a lot of underwhelming stocks.

But the Packers and their fans are happy with the team. Winning is more important than profits. The Packer stock structure exists because its fans want one thing above any others: that the team remain in Green Bay -- the NFL's smallest market with a total population of just over 100,000. Purchasing a share in the Packers doesn't even bump a buyer up on the 90,000-plus name season ticket waiting list. Yet despite this pitiful return on investment, more than 250,000 shares were sold in just over a month at $250 apiece at its last issuance.

It might not make dollars or sense to sink any dough into the Packers, Braves or any other team, but investing in a sports franchise is more about investing for your heart than listening to your head.

Other franchises have made brief dalliances with being publicly-traded only to later be bought out by majority shareholders and delisted from stock exchanges.

In 1986, at the height of the teams Larry Bird-led championship era, the Boston Celtics took a minority stake of the property public as a limited partnership. The initial public offering price was $18.50 a share, but slipped on trading to $11.35. When a majority stake was sold in 2002, new owners then bought out the remainder of the partnership.

Another franchise, perhaps the world's most popular soccer club, Manchester United, has twice been a publicly-traded stock, first in 1991 on the London Stock Exchange and again in 2012 on the New York Stock Exchange. In 2012 shares were anticipated to trade between $16 and $20 a share, but proved a disappointing $14 each when they hit the market.

The Cleveland Indians and NHL's Florida Panthers also briefly danced with public ownership. Like the Boston Celtics, the Panthers' publicly traded period ended when most of the team was sold in 2001. In just over a year of trading, the Indians' stock underperformed the Nasdaq Composite Index.

A likely safer play on the franchise market is Madison Square Garden, which is named for the iconic sports and entertainment venue that it also owns. Though its stock price has fluctuated up and down over the years, owning even a small sliver of the Manhattan real estate it encompasses makes it near certain investors won't lose their shirts, or in this case, jerseys.

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