The Liberty Media logo.
Liberty Media, which owns the Atlanta Braves, about one-third of Live Nation, and approximately 70 percent of SiriusXM, has officially rolled out a $500 million IPO for its newly formed “special purpose acquisition company.”
Colorado-headquartered Liberty Media announced the pricing of the half-billion-dollar IPO (consisting specifically of 50 million units at $10 apiece) yesterday, and the Liberty Media Acquisition Corporation debuted on the NASDAQ today. Each of these units (symbol LMACU) includes one share as well as one-fifth of a warrant to buy additional shares at $11.50 apiece. (Investors can only exercise whole warrants, however.)
Moreover, said units are expected to split into two listings – one for the common stock (LMACA) and one for the warrants (LMACW) – in about 50 days. Liberty Media’s Formula One Group, which owns the aforementioned third of Live Nation and five percent of Indian music streaming platform JioSaavn, will possess the company’s stake in LMAC.
Aside from Live Nation, JioSaavn, and the namesake Formula One, the group holds seven percent of the entity behind the Denver Nuggets’ Ball Arena, three percent of the Drone Racing League, and six percent of Tastemade, among other assets.
Organizationally, Liberty Media president and CEO Greg Maffei, who is also chairman of Live Nation and SiriusXM’s respective boards of directors, is set to lead Liberty Media Acquisition Corporation’s management team. (This team will feature “other members” of Liberty’s current higher-up roster.) The company “intends to search for a target in the media, digital media, music, entertainment, communications, telecommunications and technology industries,” Liberty Media stated in the release announcing LMACU’s IPO pricing.
But the announcement message doesn’t pinpoint a specific “target” – potentially encompassing “one or more businesses” – and moving forward, it’ll be interesting to see which assets the “blank check company” makes a play for. LMACU rested at $12.75 per unit when the market closed today – nearly 28 percent above the $10-per-unit IPO price, and the shares briefly approached $13.30 early this morning.
Liberty Media’s divisions have separate stock listings, and the Formula One Group (traded as FWONA) dipped slightly on the day, to $36.67 per share.
However, FWONA shares started the week at less than $36 each – up from about $33 per share in late October. The roughly 10 percent boost may be attributable, in part, to Live Nation stock gains. The Beverly Hills-based concert promoter has quietly regained all the value it parted with in 2020 – and even reached an all-time-high of $78 per share, well above its pre-COVID price. Today, LYV closed at $72.28, a little more than a three percent decline from Thursday.