Q1 2024 Atlanta Braves Holdings Inc and Liberty Media Corp Earnings Call

Participants

Clare Adams; Senior Manager, Investor Relations; Liberty Media Corp

Gregory Maffei; President, Chief Executive Officer, Director; Liberty Media Corp

Brian Wendling; Principal Financial Officer, Chief Accounting Officer; Liberty Media Corp

Stefano Domenicali; President and Chief Executive Officer; Formula One Group

Derek Schiller; President and Chief Executive Officer; Atlanta National League Baseball Club, LLC

Renee Wilm; Chief Executive Officer; Las Vegas Grand Prix, Inc.

Vijay Jayant; Analyst; Evercore ISI

Jeff Wlodarczak; Analyst; Pivotal Research Group

David Karnovsky; Analyst; JPMorgan

Ben Swinburne; Analyst; Morgan Stanley

Steven Lasik; Analyst; Goldman Sachs

Barton Crockett; Analyst; Rosenblatt Securities

Bryan Kraft; Analyst; Deutsche Bank

David Joyce; Analyst; Seaport Research Partners

Matthew Harrigan; Analyst; Benchmark Company

Presentation

Operator

Welcome to the Liberty Media corporation's 2024 first-quarter earnings call. (Operator Instructions) As a reminder, this conference will be recorded May 8.
I would now like to turn the call over to Clare Adams, Senior Manager, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Clare Adams

Good morning. Before we begin, we'd like to remind everyone that this call includes certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual events or results could differ materially due to a number of risks and uncertainties including those mentioned in the most recent Form 10-K and 10-Q filed by Liberty Media and Atlanta Braves Holdings with the SEC.
These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this call, and Liberty Media and Atlanta Braves Holdings expressly disclaim any obligation or undertaking to disseminate any updates or revisions to any forward-looking statements contained herein to reflect any change in Liberty Media or Atlanta Braves Holdings' expectations with regard thereto or any change in events, conditions, or circumstances on which any such statement is based.
On today's call, we will discuss our non-GAAP financial measures for Liberty Media, SiriusXM, and Atlanta Braves holdings including adjusted EBITA and adjusted EBITDA. The required definitions and reconciliations for Liberty Media, SiriusXM, and Atlanta Braves holdings schedules one through three can be found at the end of the earnings press release issued today, which are available on Liberty Media and Atlanta Braves Holdings websites.
Now I'd like to turn the call over to Greg Maffei, Liberty's President, and CEO.

Gregory Maffei

Thank you, Clare, and good morning to all. Today speaking on the call, we will also have Formula One's President and CEO, Stefano Domenicali; and Liberty's Chief Accounting and Principal Financial Officer, Brian Wendling. Also, during Q&A, we will answer questions related to Atlanta Braves Holdings and Braves' management will be available as well.
So beginning with Liberty Sirius XM, the LSXM. series transaction is progressing well. The regulatory process is on track and we still expect a close by the early in the third quarter.
Turning to Sirius XM itself and solid first quarter performance, revenue up 1%, EBITDA up 4%. There continuing to benefit from cost optimization across the board they expect if they don't pay net adds improvements in the second half and in fiscal 24 versus 23, they did also on their call reiterate the 2024 garden guidance. They are maintaining margins while investing to support future growth.
Management's focus on a couple of key strategic initiatives, and we've seen some still early but promising metrics on the new app. We continue to move engagement for lower listening cohorts to higher listening levels, and we've been able to adapt to consumer feedback more quickly utilizing this application. Our Series exclusive content continues to attract new customers. James Corden series recently, which was recently initiated quickly moved into the top top3 shows. Notably, we're also progressing with the rollout of three 60 Al Kelly and expanded Fund VI Genesis partnership, which will integrate three 60 L and adoption of three six sell leads to better consumer trends, including higher conversion.
Now turning to Formula One Group. We were thrilled to announce in April the acquisition of motor GP. I want to reiterate the attractive qualities of this asset at a global level league level sport with incredible racing. For example, across the first four races, we've had 10 riders across seven teams, reach the podium and the average time to decide the race when there has been about a second on Monday, the new technical regulations for the sport were announced for the 2027 timeframe to expect even closer racing and more overtaking utilizing these new technical risks attendance at the races is performing very well. For example, the Portuguese GP at Port amount was up 41% versus the prior year. And the Spanish GP, it has had the highest attendance since 2015. The sport is awesome, and Liberty has experienced to help them hopefully grow the exposure across the world.
A couple of deal updates here. We're also progressing on required regulatory filings. We have syndicated financing commitments and hedged our foreign exchange exposure, and we still expect to close by year-end.
Turning now to H1, we've had successful races in several key growth markets. We returned to China for the first time since 2019 and the first time with a Chinese driver. It was a sold-out race and live viewership on CCTV. was up 50% versus 2019. Miami was an exciting and very competitive race. I want to congratulate Lendo on winning his first GP after 15 podiums from a template group. Mclaren upgrades are working well and we expect more competitive racing from that going forward.
We continue to see growth in the U.S. engagement. Miami was sold out with a new attendance record of 275,000, F1 achieved its largest live USTD. audience at 3.1 million with a peak of $3.6 million. We also had our largest audience for a Sprint race since the format was introduced in 2021. We also hosted the second F1 Academy event of the season in Miami. We are excited that we have contributed to and promoting continued momentum in women's sports. We are attracting more diverse audiences with it. They're exciting and relevant to all at F1 Academy. Instagram followers are 55% female, but also 45% male everything launches, women's sports, we recently announced new DR series with Netflix and Reese Witherspoon production company.
Hello, Sunshine about F1 Academy, and we look forward to seeing the series growth.
Turning now to LBGP., a few updates. We redefined the product ladder to reach a greater range of fan base. We are now integrating integrating the commercial and marketing functions across F1 LGBP. and quit more closely to achieve better Harmony and cost savings. We think this will allow us to have aligned sponsorship and sales or efforts across the board. And as I mentioned, it will be more cost effective kicked off the events business at Grand Prix Plaza in Las Vegas, hosting some exciting brands, including a Super Bowl media party, Autodesk, CrowdStrike and our own QVC's age of possibility.
Now touching briefly on quit. We closed the acquisition in early January. Some of the first quarter highlights were the 2024 All-Star game, which was NBA experiences, largest event ever for ticket packages. And revenue and F. one experiences sees saw solid demand across the first three races of H1, including a solid across all products in Australia. We do believe there is strategic value in having Quint and everyone under the same roof. The data sharing across companies allows us to know the fan better and improve our touch points and leveraging quick sales and marketing will create efficiencies and leverage the sales process, including at LGBP.
As I mentioned, I want to reiterate, we expect wind to be adjusted EBITDA accretive to F1 and for turning on touch on Live Nation briefly, our global fan demand continues to surge. First quarter revenue was up 21% and AY. was up 15%. They had a record first quarter for sponsorship, also up 24% indicators point to another record year. Over 85% of the large shows have booked were booked versus 75% at this time in the prior year. And concert ticket sales for Arena and amphitheaters are pacing up double digit levels. We also see continued success in international markets and with venue, the venue nation strategy. Ticket sales for the Latin packs were up double digits in the U.S. and at venues, we're opening at least 12 major global venues in the 2024 time frame, and we have capacity for 8 million additional fans, and we think we can enhance the consumer experience and generate strong returns.
Finally, touching on the Braves off to another great start to the season despite early injuries and a tough Dodgers series last weekend, great win last night in the ninth inning as usual, with us, strong demand continues we've seen multiple satellites sellouts already this season. We're trending number four in average attendance per game across NOV, and we have sold 93% of our ticket capacity season today, we've completed the renovations at Truist Park ahead of the season. There's a new Lexus level premium boxes. There's an expanded retail store capacity. We have the Jim Beam bourbon decks with bars replicating the links between the pitchers medical plate and these upgrades are already generating incremental revenue. This season, we announced several new sponsors this season early, including Ball Corp. and Lexus and we are creating more inventory around the bar ballpark, including LED signage. And we are leveraging the demand for renewals on our existing partnerships. The Braves are positioned for another great year on and off the field.
So with that, I'll turn it over to you, Brian, for more on our financial results.

Brian Wendling

Thank you, Greg, and good morning. At quarter end, Liberty Sirius XM Group had attributed cash and liquid investments of $64 million, excluding 71 million of cash held at Sirius XM during the quarter, Liberty Sirius XM paid down 65 million under the Sirius XM margin loan. Using cash on hand, there's 1.1 billion of undrawn margin loan capacity related to our Sirius XM margin loan as of quarter-end. As of May seventh, the value of our Sirius XM stock was 10 billion, and we have 1.2 billion in principal amount of debt against these holdings. Total Liberty Sirius XM Group attributed principal amount of debt is $11.1 billion, which includes 9.3 billion of debt at Sirius XM.
Turning to the Formula One Group at quarter end Formula One Group had attributed cash liquid investments and monetizable public holdings of 1.3 billion, which includes 1 billion of cash at Formula one. Quinn acquisition closed in January and from within was funded with 205 million of Formula One Group cash on hand, net of the cash that was acquired total Formula One Group attributed principal amount of debt was 2.9 billion, which includes 2.4 billion of debt at Formula One, leaving $531 million at the corporate level. Our first $500 million revolver is undrawn and our leverage at quarter end was 1.7 times.
Looking at the up one operating business, as we've reiterated multiple times at its best annual analyze on an annual basis, giving variability in the calendar. With that said, however, I will make some brief remarks on the first quarter, there were three races held in the first quarter compared to two races in the prior year period. F1 recognized an additional race promotion fee this year, as well as a higher proportion of season based income due to three out of 24 races occurring during Q1 24 compared to two out of 23 in the prior year, which was ahead of the similar rate cancellation in Q2 23. Other revenue increased due to the start of the F. two vehicle cycle, which has largely offset within Other cost of F1 revenue as well as higher hospitality revenue and freight income of one also recognized revenue and costs related to the F1 Academy due to the earlier start of the season.
Compared to last year, adjusted EBITDA grew alongside revenue in the quarter, team payments were higher due to the higher pro rata recognition as well as the expectation of increased impairments for the full year. A reminder that team payments should be analyzed on a full year basis, the revenue recognized based on the mix of flywheel and European races impacts. Housing payments appear as a percentage of pretax share EBIT. When looking on a quarterly basis is up. One has grown EBIT over the past several years. The percentage payout has shifted with F1, recognizing a greater proportion of the economic upside as protein share EBITDA has reached certain thresholds.
We expect to continue to realize leverage on the team payment team payout going forward. The note that the incremental payout percentage on protein share EBIT growth recognized in 2023 should not be applied to future growth. Other cost of F. one revenue and SG&A continue to be best viewed as a percent of total revenue for the year.
Looking at corporate and other results, which as of this quarter includes the consolidation of Corporate and Other revenue includes quite results in approximately 7 million of rental income related to the Las Vegas Grand Prix Plaza, corporate and other adjusted EBITDA was a loss of 6 million in the quarter. This includes the rental income credit results and other corporate overhead now at the start of the year, seasonally light for client with modest demand activity, while the business still incurs ordinary course fixed operating expenses, which largest and most profitable events take place in the second quarter and fourth quarter for the Kentucky Derby in May and larger and more frequent or an increased quantity of F1 hospitality events held in the fourth quarter. We expect corporate and other adjusted EBITDA will benefit from rental income and credit results through the rest of the year.
At the Liberty Life Group has attributed cash liquid investments and monetizable public holdings of $423 million, which includes ETF assets. There's a $400 million or 400 million of undrawn margin loan capacity related to our Live Nation margin loan. And as of May seventh, the value of our Live Nation stock held at the Liberty Life Group was 6.7 billion. We have $1.2 billion in principal amount of debt against these hold Liberty and our consolidated subsidiaries are in compliance with our debt covenants at quarter end. And I will turn quickly with that to ABH H, there were no regular season home games played in the first quarter of 23 or 24 or 23.
Revenue growth primarily reflects higher broadcasting with more away games in the current year held due to the early start of the regular season as well as higher Gameday related revenue from increased demand and attendance at spring training home games brands continue to invest in payroll, which is reflected in increased baseball operating costs and the battery grew revenue 13% and adjusted EBITDA 9% in the quarter CapEx related to the capital improvement projects completed at Truist Park ahead of the 24 season will total approximately $15 million across Q4 of 23 and early 2000 for these projects are generating incremental revenue, as Greg said, for the Braves already and that the battery, the Truist headquarter remains headquarters. Project remains on budget and on schedule.
With that I'll turn it over to Stefano to discuss Formula One.

Stefano Domenicali

Thanks, Brian. The 2024 season is off to a great start with lots of action on the track and the gap between the teams across the group getting close, why Red Bull and Max first happened continue to show their strength. We have seen regular purchase from Ferrari, including one and two in Melbourne showing their ongoing improvement as well as increasingly strong performance from McLaren, including a great first race win by landowners in Miami in front of a sellout crowd. The battle in the midfield is the closest it has been for many years, and we look forward to this continuing as the season progresses. We have 24 races this year with six prints events.
And I'm also delighted to have the F1 Academy alongside us at seven one events. The return to China after full year break was incredible, and it was great to see a sold-out event with over 200,000 weekend attendees interest in the Events and Align a growing younger talent base in the country with all our Chinese fans cheating on their home zero one one to over 1.5 million viewers watched the waste live on CCTD. five, far beyond the EUR1 million when we last visited in 2019. China was also host to our first point of the season, one by Maximus tap another bull with Lewis Hamilton taking second place. Sprint continues to deliver great action for our fans, broadcasters, sponsors and promoters.
There has been plenty of drivers news of the track at the start of 2024. We had the exciting announcement that Lewis Hamilton will join Ferrari in 2025. Fernando Alonso has committed to remain with Aston Martin, who can work with go to St. Albert in 2025. And we have yet to see what capital sites will be next year. This continues to create huge excitement and anticipation for our fans with 10 drivers. The left confirmed their seat for the next year we have seen records being broken for attendances at our races for the start of 2024 and expect very strong figures throughout the season.
Bahrain saw record raise the attendants and in Melbourne, we have a huge crowd of 452,000, beating last year, record attendances of 445,000. We also saw good growth in Japan will come in 229,000 fans, up 3% on 2023. Alongside this, we continue to see very strong demand for the power plant with over 11,000 tickets sold for the first four races of the season where we operate the power plant we had to sell out in Bahrain and Saudi for the 2nd year running and 2,500 race day gas to China compared to just 1,100 when we last ratio there in 2019. H1 continues to grow our overall engagement and fan base. We are evolving our view data methodology to ensure we are capturing all our audiences globally and are working with Nielsen to build the model that capture a fuller scope.
We had over EUR70 million cumulative TV viewers for the opening roughly we can in Bahrain with 12 million in Germany, thanks to extensive free to have coverage on RTL through the first three races. We've seen particularly strong viewership in growth markets such as China and the Middle East. We now have 79 million total social media followers up 24% year on year with new followers growth also boosted by the introduction of new platforms like threats and WhatsApp on Instagram, our most popular social platform, 75% of our followers are under 35, 40% and under 25% and 30% of our under 25 followers are female. The US has gained 500,000 new followers in 2024 up to the Chinese Grand Prix, which is up 90% over the further growth for the same period last year.
We also have a year's worth of forward growth in one week in the Chinese market surrounding the Chinese Grand Prix in the U.S., we've also seen year on year growth across other digital platforms. USF. one TV subscribers are up 16%. Page view across F. one.com and app are up to 28% energy three users or those who sign up for an account on F1 platforms are up 32% globally. Unique visitors to F. one. Com and app are up 4% year on year, with page views up 29% registered users up 28%. The total number of F1 TV subscribers is seen strong growth with lower churn rates at all times high customer satisfaction season, six of Drive to Survive premiered February 23rd.
We have reached the top 10 on that phase in over 40 markets and continues to have among the highest completion rate or the numbers of people watch more than 90% of the sellers on the platform when compared to both the risk and scripted and unscripted content production continues for the Apple fame, which is on pace for the expected release in summer 2025.
On the commercial side of the business, we had a very strong first quarter. We had growth across all revenue stream, benefiting from one additional race held compared to last year, as well as growth from new sponsorship and media rights agreements and underlying escalators. We continue to see our business and partners benefiting from growth in overall Tandem and the value of form brings to par.
As you know, sponsorship last week we announced the world's leading software provider, digital consultant. Global has joined as an official partner in a new multi-year agreement. Also in March, we announced McDonald's as regional partner, formal one in Latin America. This is the first of its kind for F. one in the region has the support of the U.S. continues to grow in Latin America.
On media rights, we continue to see strong demand and impressive work by all our broadcaster to bring our sport to millions of fans around the world. We recently announced five years renewal with Viaplay in the Netherlands and across the Nordic markets. The deal retains our partnership structure in the region, creating a strong position for our F. one TV Pro product that will continue to generate substantial additional fee.
We also announced a new two year agreement with fan code that sees the sports streaming platform become the exclusive broadcast partner to form one in India until the end of 2012 35 seasons. This is a huge opportunity in a market with a growing fan base, especially among younger and female supporter. Our estimate shows that we have 60 million fans in India with one into having started following F1 in the last four years. And once the Pro with also remaining market in India, 2024 results are also benefiting from the new been support agreement in the Middle East, which we referenced on our fourth quarter earnings call. We recently announced a subscription free streaming channel fast for the fires in the U.S. to watch F1, F2, F3 and F. one Academy race replays and highlights for the rounds of classic Grand Prix and popular racing documentaries. The new channel will be distributed for fast watch on leading platforms, including Samsung TV plus Amazon Free-TV and Pluto TV.
In addition to generating a revenue, we also expect it to push more fans to both ESPN and F1 TV Pro. We are confident heading into our US media rights renewal for 2026 with strong growth in our U.S. tandem sports content remaining highly attractive to broadcasters and newer players continue to bid for sports rights. In addition, to the U.S. key media rights renewal up after 2035 season include Latin America, Brazil, Canada and most of Asia, including Japan, also on media rights following a successful first season, F1 kids will return to 2020 for the program is providing to be an effective way to engage children in four one in a way that's accessible and fun for them. So I'm delighted he's back for a second.
Turning to race promotion. We announced our 2025 race calendar in April for what will be the Formula One, 75 anniversary here, we expect to announce details of the six 2025 print venues in due course the calendar featuring 24 races and will commence in Australia on 60 March and conclude in Abu Dhabi on 77, we will have just one Saturday night race in Las Vegas. So the inventory will return to the traditional Sunday race days and Nancy the calander earlier than we ever add, allow us to focus on optimizing the schedule for the future years and planned logistics more efficiently to 2025.
It also makes our promoter, more sustainable partners by giving them greater certainty around planning their races and other events for next year. There continues to be huge interest and demand for our races around the world, and our focus is to maintain the right strategic balance of location and opportunities. While being clear, we currently believe a 24 risk capital is the optimal number of events turning to Vegas, we are looking forward to year. Two of that is building our success of last year event as DGP. continues to generate great demand on the sponsorship side, both locally and for the sport. More broadly, for example, we could not be more excited about our partnership with American Express, and they're engaging activation on site across the F one ecosystem as well as their support for F1 Academy.
In March, we enjoyed a successful American Express presales to kick off ticket sales for 2020 for Vegas race, and we look forward to the continued growth of our partners. We also continue to see progress on off track action for fans. Our F1 sim racing series got underway recently and continues to provide exciting action for France and all competitors. At Warner, Kate recently opened the first of several planned the US vendors in Boston as their kids six to take advantages of one continued momentum in the US. Boston is off to a strong start and have the great launch in hosting 600 semi to guests with a ton of media coverage and funnel cake. London saw a 40 14% increase in attendance this quarter compared to the same period last year. And the Birmingham venues is also performing very, very well. Evelyn exhibition is now moving to other venues around the world, having opened in NBN in February in Toronto last week, and this follows the successful opening of residency in Madrid, whether it was the biggest selling temporary exhibition of 2023.
Turning to sustainability and diversity and inclusion initiatives. In April, we were pleased to publish our first F. one impact report, providing an update on all the work delivered on our journey to net zero by 2030, we are on track to meet our targets. We achieved a 13 reduction through increasing our remote operation using renewable energy in factories, offices and events and from reducing the volume of freight. We have a strong pipeline of action to deliver the remaining 37% reduction target by 2030 on DNA, our first group of students from former ones engineering scholarship to placement with F1 teams. And by 2025, we will have founded the studies of 50 students from underrepresented groups to undertake their studies in mechanical engineering. If one of them, we started the second season in Saudi and join us for the second event in Miami with exciting racing agreed driving across the field.
In Miami, America raises coordinate grown joint degrees as the wildcard entry in a deal with the regaining teams championship remuneration and the key fee if one of them you see this will be shown live in over 160 international territories will be on F1 TV Pro and streamed live on F1 Academy, social channels. We have also been delighted to announce Charlotte Tilbury Fulmar, Tommy for an American Express as official partner of the series, we have also launched the F1 Academy discovery. Your drive aimed at giving young female Carter's the opportunity to get into grass roots level of our sport. Its first initiative was launched by motorsport UK to identify and nurture UK carting talent from the age of eight.
The number of female participate in Asia 11, 16 qualifying for the British indoor gardening championship has more than tripled and engagement programs will run alongside the old seven F. one Academy events in 2024. We are proud of this work and remain very focused on making the sport more open, diverse and sustainable place 2024 will continue to be an exciting time for our sport, and I'm looking forward to the on-track action and opportunities we have as a business as we continue to go from strength to strength. I wanted to tap full speed ahead.
And now I will turn the call back over to Greg.

Gregory Maffei

Yes. Thanks, Stefano and Brian. And to the listening audience we appreciate your continued interest in Liberty Liberty Media and the Atlanta Braves holdings.
And now, operator, I'd like to open the line for questions.

Question and Answer Session

Operator

Thank you. (Operator Instructions) Vijay Jayant, Evercore ISI.

Vijay Jayant

Ken, can you talk about the trajectory of impairments as a percentage of pretax EBITDA over the last couple of years, that's sort of it declined about 300 basis points. I know that structured in the splits with the teams that we're not aware of. But could we assume that kind of operating leverage again, 2024?

Gregory Maffei

And then anything you could say about the sponsorship pipeline at Formula one, and it seems to be that that revenue stream is slowing down a bit.

Vijay Jayant

Obviously, we can't really know what's happening there.

Brian Wendling

Yes, P.J., this is Brian, I'll take the team payment one. We're trying to do the most information we can here without giving you the full model. But over the course of the past few years, is up. One has grown free Team Share EBITDA and EBIT under the current Concorde Agreement. We've moved through various brands, bands of pre Team Share EBITDA where the payout to the teams has decreased as a percentage 3G bands. We're now at a point where the percentage to the teams is fixed for incremental EBITDA and EBIT up through the end of this current Concorde Agreement, we do expect to continue to have leverage in the team payments as a percent of pretax share EBIT this year or adjusted EBITDA on our on our reported results, but not at that incremental rate that you noted that we saw from 22 to 23.

Gregory Maffei

Stefano, do you want to touch on sponsorship?
Yes.

Vijay Jayant

Thank you, Greg. I would say the just to talk about our sponsorship pipeline, I would say the situation is very positive because I think that if we just look back at just couple of years, ago, we had only four global sponsor. Now we have signed global sponsor, not original partnership, and the pipeline is very strong. And I would say, as you know, we are not even hear any kind of expectation. But the situation is very solid and today is not only a problem of quantity of sponsorship is really related to the quality we need to ensure that everyone is investing for one has the right quality in terms of exposure in term of experience in terms of what we can offer. So I would say that's really a very, very positive trend that we will see together with our partners who believes in promo.

Gregory Maffei

If I could just add, I agree with everything Stefano said, I feel very good about where we are recognizing sponsorship revenue for the balance of this year and into 2025 and are working hard at building that pipeline for 26 and beyond.
Great thanks so much.

Operator

Jeff Wlodarczak, Pivotal Research Group.

Jeff Wlodarczak

Good morning.
First of all, congrats on Lendo winning the Miami GP. It's always good to get a new face top of the podium.
I've actually got two questions, not related to F. one one on Live Nation wants Siri, Greg, on Live Nation. You comment on the pending antitrust case against Live Nation? And then also, Greg, you mentioned the car app then seeing some sort of early positive signs. When are we going to know if that was successful, that's sort of a second half thing we should be looking for.
And then looking forward, do you feel comfortable, I guess, all else being equal economically that Siri can get back to positive subscriber growth.
Thanks on the app and economic growth.

Gregory Maffei

Okay. So look, I think on the on the discussion around Live Nation and the interest issues the management team led by Joe summarized to well on their call last Thursday, the DOJ investigation appears focused on specific business practices within divisions of the Company, not the merger or the business structure alive doesn't believe the big breakup of Live Nation Ticketmaster would be legally defensible remedy. And beyond that, we're kind of limited to what was said on that live earnings call if you listen to that.
Turning to CRE, look, I think it's early days. We certainly would hope during the balance of this year to see positive impact and greater learnings from the new app, the way the app is being rolled because of the app as a platform, you'll see us continue to roll out ad series, new modules and new opportunities, which will help us get benefits. So I think you'll see some learnings early and hopefully more growing over time. But the exact timing of those and how the consumer both how we release them and how the consumer takes them up are still open to question on economic growth. I do believe that we can start driving we'll see a better numbers in 24 versus 23 on SP. and A. And I do think over time, this app will be critical to helping us grow and getting back to a growth path path at Sirius.

Operator

David Karnovsky, JPMorgan.

David Karnovsky

And thanks for the question for David or Greg can you talk to F1 TV and how we should think of this as a possible growth driver for media rights this year?
Wanted to understand better how the price increases have been received so far along with the new user experience.
And then on Quinn, I appreciate the commentary and the strategic value to F1. But maybe you can also discuss Quinn on a standalone basis, the market for premium hospitality, what's the kind of growth drivers over the long term?
And just for Brian on this, on an end to note and the seasonality for Quinn with revenue or margin.

Gregory Maffei

All right. Stephanie, do I want to start?

Stefano Domenicali

Yes, you want to start and I can think Yes, Greg, it is fine for you.
Absolutely.
I would say, first of all, definitely the as we always said, these initial is an additional arm and for our fabs at offer to fund that, some of them are very, very expert, they can analyze all the data we are putting on on the screen. And the good thing is that the numbers that we have seen so far are very encouraging because I actually even in Miami, that has been almost a record subscribers that we see. So it's a very, very important element that is related to the future of the immediate evolution that we want to offer to our customer. We didn't receive any negative comment on price increase. You may see maybe because it was too low before that to be a good point. But so far, no one have said anything. And I would say for us, it's really relevant to keep up in term of quality of the product in term of content of the product. And this is something that will develop even further within synergy with the artificial intelligence that will be that will play a very important part of our development with our future.

Gregory Maffei

Great.
Thank you, Stefano. And I'll touch briefly on the quick business drivers and let Brian, as you noted, touch on some seasonality, which I expect his comments will be fairly limited, but I don't want to cut it down.
Look at the drivers for the business. I think there are several. One is and we mentioned I mentioned one already the opportunity to help us be a better sales arm and be more effective for Formula One itself, particularly around LBGP. And you've seen us do more integration of that sales arm and utilize their customer knowledge, their customer strengths, the things that they do well to help us sell better, particularly at the high end at LBGP., another driver of the business, though, is their ability to help other F1 promoters and elements sell their products. So they work with both teams and promoters, for example, Qatar to help sell tickets, two of their events, not just our event and to help sell out the things that they do and do ancillary services and ancillary events around the motor around the GPs A third driver is obviously adding new sports and new events, and you've seen them grow on that and expect that they will continue to do that over time. And hopefully that's a place where Liberty may be able to help them open the door to new sports?

Brian Wendling

David, on seasonality, we can't give you the very specific details, but what I'll what I'll say is that Q1 is probably the lowest quarter for Quint, followed by Q. three Q. two and Q4 really ramp up because you have the Kentucky Derby and you have a lot more of the larger F1 events that Quint participates in. So you'll you'll see that Q2 and Q4 definitely vary materially from what you see in Q1.

Operator

Ben Swinburne, Morgan Stanley.

Ben Swinburne

Greg, now that you've had at least the public announcement with Moto G P, I'm just wondering if you had any update on opportunities that may have emerged your conversations you've had in terms of what you can do with that business now that you're all the partners of Moto G P.?
No, that Liberty is going to be acquiring most of the Company.
Anything maybe you would add from the call you did a couple of months ago and then Stephanie, I think last quarter you said sort of Concord agreement next one would be something you guys could maybe finish up pretty quickly, not a lot of controversy wanted to see there is an update there, particularly as it relates to Brian's point about team splits being fixed going forward for this deal. Any thoughts on how we might want to think about what that might look like in the next one. Thank you, guys.

Gregory Maffei

Thanks, Brent. So on Moto G P, when we after the announcement, we had an outpouring of interest from both our potential broadcast partners, OEM.'s potential sites, all of which are very interesting. Unfortunately, due to the nature of the regulatory process, we will be formulated those amongst ourselves in our plans, but we really can't reach out and do anything concrete with the motor GP management team to avoid gun jumping until we have regulatory approval. So we are considering plans we have some really good ideas. I think I hope and we hope to get permission to execute on those sooner rather than later.

Stefano Domenicali

On my side, Ben, with regard to the update on Coke agreement. As we always said, that the situation, as you know very well, this will expiry until 2025. Now we are in the process of discussion with the teams. The most important point is to keep the situation as stable as possible. These are the points of discussion. And as you can imagine, we cannot go into detail of it. But as soon as we can, we will we will share what we can do. As I said, that the situation is optimal to keep discussing with the teams that with all the relevant part is the best way to finalize everything for a stronger future up to a longer term.

Operator

Steven Lasik, Goldman Sachs.

Steven Lasik

Great. Thanks for the questions.
And maybe for Greg on F1 media rights. I'm curious if you could talk more about this strategy. Have you and some of the renewals you called out in the release, it looks like you took a good bit of duration and Marina and maybe align the Nordics with Sky. I know some of the Americas and Asian contracts are up and 25. Anything more to add to that, that conversation or that strategy on media rights would be helpful.

Gregory Maffei

And I think in general on media rights, we've been very happy with the renewals and interest. We've seen. We, as you noted, some of the good renewals we've had that have been very attractive. We continue to see strong demand, and we continue to see, as we talked about F1 TV, we continue to see interesting ways in which F1 TV can be an asset working with our media partners. The US renewal is obviously out ahead. It's been interesting to watch some of the most recent renewals around either other motorsports or other sports in general in the US. And hopefully, those give us some confidence about given where the demand we've seen, both among broadcasters and the like and the level of interest in races, like I obviously mentioned already the Miami one, what that will lead to.
Got it.

Steven Lasik

And then just on race promotion, you have, I think 10 raises up for renewal over the next two years, Stefano, you called out the 11 interested cities being serious contenders for GPUs this past weekend. Could you add a little bit more context around the supply demand dynamic you're seeing right now and what you think that could mean for things like promotion step-up investments in hospitality, fan experience would be helpful.
Thank you.

Stefano Domenicali

Well, for sure what we have seen and what we have seen happening in the course of the last years because of the strong demand of our product. And because of the standard, we are, let's say, asking and working together with our promoter. We have seen everything going up in term of quality of demand, of course, economical impact for both the promoter and our site and the strong demand we are receiving just shows really the strategy is right now. The point is to keep the balance between the different continents that are requesting the different run rate and of course, what is important is it and we may have lost Stefano or maybe we are off operator checking, let me so we'll assume that we'll get stepping back.

Gregory Maffei

Maybe we can move to the next question, and we'll come back and answer that and either will tried again without Stefano, where we'll hopefully get Stefano to answer K. And operator, thank you.
Of course.

Operator

Barton Crockett, Rosenblatt Securities.

Barton Crockett

Thanks for taking the questions on. I guess I wanted to switch gears a little bit and just gave, Greg, your thoughts on baseball on the Braves and TV. and Diamond Sports on now, you know, some question about the viability of the emergence with the blackout a comp, what can you tell us about, you know, what the Braves could do if diamond isn't viable? And what are your thoughts longer-term about what should happen there with the TV rights situation there for the Braves?

Gregory Maffei

Well, I'll I'll give you one cursory comment and then let Derek perhaps if you want to contribute happy. Have you take over. I think we have some visibility into the Diamond holdings, not only from our experience with the Braves, but our experience with Charter and we watch the situation, obviously very carefully. We have a benefit, as we mentioned before, have an enormously attractive territory and think we have options in the event that they are unable to complete their successful emergence from Chapter 11, but I'll let Derrick touch on that a little more if he would like.

Derek Schiller

Thanks, Greg. Yes, to the first point, and obviously, Carriage disputes are sort of commonplace. Unfortunately, and we don't like the fact that this carriage dispute is going on. We're not a party to it. We're hoping that Comcast and values get together to Greg's point. We're obviously monitoring the whole bankruptcy proceedings and doing our part to protect our rights at this point in time, Diamond Valley's is fulfilling their terms with us, including full payment. But if the if the rights come back to us, we are very optimistic because As Greg noted, we have a very large territory, one of the largest in sports. There's huge demand on the team. And we believe there's more optimism than pessimism with the future of Braves television rights in that marketplace.

Barton Crockett

And that's great. If I could just follow up. I mean that the precedent at some of the other baseball teams has been if they lose their RSN carriage that they're having to move to a lower revenue model where perhaps you get broader exposure on broadcast, but less revenue, sounds like you don't think that that's what the Braves would face if it came to.
It is am I hearing you correctly?

Derek Schiller

Yes, I think you are hearing me correctly, partly because the other situations that we've seen around in particular baseball marketplaces are just vastly different. And their situations I don't think are necessarily analogous to us and we have about six states that are in our territory and about 35 million people in that territory. So one way to look at this is to the extent that we can unlock the opportunity to offer the Braves content to a wider stretch of that territory to more of those 35 million people. We think that the revenue should follow and we've been modeling that and feel like we're in a good position. Should those rights come back to us. But again, at this point in time, we're still operating under the terms of the values agreement and they are as well. So we'll continue that to the extent that that that stays the case.

Operator

Bryan Kraft, Deutsche Bank.

Bryan Kraft

Hi, good morning. I had one for Greg on Sirius and one on F. one for a second half is back or for Greg and Greg, I started to ask this question again this quarter, but dumb, a lot of people want to know. I know you stated that the Sirius transaction is on track to close in early 3Q, but can you just walk us through the sequence of steps to close? Just comment on whether my closing might get pulled into early June? Seems like it could from someone on the outside looking in.
And then on F. one, I was just wondering if you could talk about what you're seeing in terms of race promotion contract renewals as far as step-ups on renewals and escalators within the contracts, I think pre-COVID race promotion didn't seem like much of a growth opportunity, but with growth in demand over the past few years and improving promoters economics. Wondering if you think that race promotion is now more of a growth opportunity over the medium to long term, even outside of Vegas, which is kind of its own thing.
And then and then separately, can you talk about what you've seen with Las Vegas ticket sales since they went on sale in late March?

Gregory Maffei

Well, I'm going to let Renee walk you through the regulatory steps that we anticipate in oh seven. I think you're back on so after we'll let you talk about risk management. I think direct?
Yes.

Renee Wilm

So with regard to the hearing closing, we're making very good progress with the SEC as well as on the SEC front. And we are still on target. I think as we mentioned on earlier this year, that we'd be looking to close. It's sometime during the summer.

Gregory Maffei

Stefano, do you want to touch on race promotion?
Yes.

Stefano Domenicali

Yes, I would say following that to what I was trying to say before, I don't know whether it was counted but full brain inflammation in the repo motion before COVID, everyone was worried about the fact in terms of revenue stream, this could have been a very satellites. And actually the fact that we have a lot of demands, of course, is pushing up also the possibility of having or maximizing in the best way that we can. And the reason for the motion fees connected, of course, that this is, of course, a relevant point, but that's to be connected to our strategic development differently. So everything is progressing very, very well. And I would say in the next couple of years, I'm expecting to see and we are expecting to announce also some new venues that could be very attractive to grow the business forward.

Gregory Maffei

If I could just add to that to Stefanos point, I think for a long time, it was perceived that the growth in promotion would come from incremental races. And we obviously went from 18 or something to up to this 24 level, which is where we do not anticipate growing any more races.
Fun. I think we talked about at the Investor Day back in November. It actually creates a great incentive scarcity to be able to play promoters off against each other and not trying to take advantage of them, but just given the amount of demand we have, both among fans to attend and among promoters to host an event, we've been able to find attractive pricing and good uplifts, and we continue to find new venues and new locations, which find it very attractive given the amount of demand we have and given the opportunities they've seen, others pursue. So so far, so good on promotion. And I do think it continues to remain a growth area and go back go back to Rene, let you touch on the Vegas tickets.
Sure.

Bryan Kraft

Thanks, Greg.

Renee Wilm

So we were very happy with the results of our presale with our partner, American Express. But overall we are seeing a trend towards ticket purchases closer to the events, particularly in the U.S. And I would say even more so in Vegas, which is known as a last minute, market. That being said, we are working very hard on our product later this year. We have looked to really differentiate those products, creating about 10,000 new GA tickets available, which will be very much, I think appealing to that last minute market. We have now three different zones at tiered pricing. We will have the T-Mobile sphere down continuing to focus on the music entertainment as well as the racing phenomenon on the spheres on, we have a new entry level price point and Flamingo, which will have a viewing structure for fans to watch and the rating on cobalt and then a third new product offering, which is going to be announced very soon, which will focus on this skewing in the heart of the DRS zone along cobalt stream. This is allowing us to continue to really reach out to those individual consumers and the new F1 fans who want to come and watch really on track for our racing we had, as well as enjoying VM, unique Vegas style entertainment that we will continue to offer throughout the year.

Bryan Kraft

Thank you, Rene. And if I could just follow up on your comments on the Sears closing. You mentioned very good progress with the SCC. I mean, my understanding is that you had, as you see approval already for the proxy, but you have to update basically for the March quarter numbers. And so was just curious if that, you know, like what's the timing for updating the filing it seemed like that would be sort of a rubber stamp approval from the SEC since they already approved it. And then so you should be able to get to a shareholder vote on probably within the next 30 days. I was just looking for a little more color if there's anything that you can share.

Renee Wilm

You're right. It will be ready to file within the next few weeks now that we've gone through our quarterly audits. And then I would never say the SEC is going to rubber stamp anything, but we have at least cleared our financial and legal comments, which is great progress. It's hard to say exactly when we'll be ready to close. But I do think we're looking at end of Q2, early Q3 once we get everything in order for the shareholder meeting.

Bryan Kraft

Okay, got it. Thank you so much.

Operator

David Joyce, Seaport Research Partners.

David Joyce

Please proceed with your question you in thinking about the other factors outside of the pre Team Share EBIT calculation, are there any other significant expenses that are either from just straight lined or variable then sort of related to that with Quint. Just wondering that how we've been accounting for that with the current F. one related revenue, is that going to be within the former one and therefore and pre Team Share EBIT and then there other events are going to be outside of that just went just wanted to verify that there has been a split of Quinte activities that way?

Gregory Maffei

Brian, you want to take this?
Yes. So I'll start with Riquent piece first.

Brian Wendling

Yes, that So revenue that Formula One generates from Quint related to those ticket sales do flow through the team payment calculation. So those are included just like they've been beforehand.

Gregory Maffei

And then on your first question, I'm sorry, just to add there. So but you're correct, David, that non F1 related events like will not get conducted Kentucky Derby, all those flow through flying, but not the F1 team suggested that correct, sorry.

Brian Wendling

And then on your question about straight line expenses. Team payments is really the largest expense that is straight line. Other other things are more long when they're incurred when they're incurred. So think about hospitality when the event actually happens, same with freight, those types of things. Obviously, there's much fixed expenses related to payroll and the like that are relatively smooth throughout the year. But team payments would be the largest example of a per race kind of amortization.

Operator

Matthew Harrigan, Benchmark Company.

Matthew Harrigan

Thank you.
My last dangling MLP question might be more for per day, or what's your present view on how the changes rule changes are fostering interest in the game?
I think Greg. Next great investment might be a surgical clinic doing Tommy, John surgery.
If you look at what's coming off the clock, no changes, just kind of where are we now on midstream in terms of listing for the popularity of the sport? And are there any downsides what's happening back out?
Yes, there are overwhelmingly the hardware, but I'll let Derrick derrick.
I had?

Gregory Maffei

No, I was going to I'm going to tee you up. Go ahead, please.
Yes.

Derek Schiller

I mean, I think obviously, the bulk of the rule changes took place last season. So we saw the results of those and have been able to study all of last season as well as the first part of the season. I think that the overwhelming viewpoint from fans, media players, 10s is that the real changes were successful and have been embraced, and we're excited to continue with those, primarily the idea that you're you're creating again, that is a little bit shorter, a little bit more action inside of that game with some of those changes, including the elimination of the shift, things like that. But we've seen some of the small little changes that have taken place from last year to this year, some a couple of seconds taken off of the pitch clock as one example. I think it's really hard to correlate those changes to some of the things that you might be seeing and whether it be our pitcher, pitchers or others. I think it's the sample size is just too small and we're going to rely a little bit on MLB to do a full study with the Players Association on that. But I think over overall, I would tell you the real changes have been from our vantage point fans vantage point very successful and have continued to make a great gain even better.
Thanks.

Gregory Maffei

Thank you to our listening audience for all of your questions and your interest in Liberty Media and the Atlanta Braves holdings. We look forward to speaking with you again next quarter, if not sooner.

Operator

This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time, and we thank you for your participation.