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The Braves, as they are required, released their 2025 financial results on this past Wednesday. Revenue was up 18% despite the nightmare 2025 season on the field, powered by countless injuries, Alex Verdugo, and Scott Blewett. The Braves have cobbled together commercial real estate, concerts and shows, Banana Ball, parking and oh yes, a Major League Baseball franchise playing 81 games at home and broadcasting 162 regular season games plus Spring Training. If this is all new to you and you’re not familiar with how the Braves get their money outside of ticket sales, please check out this article that has much more background. We’ll look at some of the numbers but first, a brief aside.
No one at Battery Power is going to talk you into buying, selling, or holding financial instruments. Battery Power is interested in a millimeter-level understanding of each and every facet of the Braves organization. That’s why we cover the financials, and we love reporting all of it to you. Also, even if I had a take on a stock don’t listen to me, but rather you should make your own decisions about your financial needs.
Top-Line Numbers
From the release:
- Total revenue grew to $732 million in 2025, up 11% from the prior year.
- Baseball revenue increased 7% from the prior year to $635 million.
- Mixed-Use Development revenue grew 45% from the prior year to $97 million.
- Total Adjusted OIBDA [Operating Income Before Depreciation and Amortization] grew to $108 million in 2025, up 172% from the prior year.
- Baseball Adjusted OIBDA grew to $51 million in 2025, an increase of over $44 million from the prior year.
- Mixed-Use Development Adjusted OIBDA grew 51% from the prior year to $69 million.
- Operating income (loss) improved by $26 million to $(14) million, down from $(40) million in the prior year.
The Braves somehow increased baseball revenue this year over last. The Braves had 1800 fewer attendees per game in 2025. But the former streaming option, the Apple TV deal, and Banana Ball helped fill the gap. Premium seating options also help reduce the need to fill every seat.
However, the big difference is the Mixed-Use Development revenue. It increased to a financial-analyst-mouth-watering 45 percent in 2025. There are very powerful and innovative tech firms that don’t increase their revenue 45 percent year to year. Mixed-use development is rental income from The Battery Atlanta, parking-and-tenant-flush Pennant Park, and Truist Park and The Roxy events and concerts.
What’s an impairment charge?
The Braves took an operating loss of $40 million in 2024, but it was $14 million in 2025. But actually, they made money, depending on how you look at it. The Braves took a $30 million impairment charge due to the loss of the contract between their Fanduel-branded television partner Main Street Sports Group, formerly known as Diamond Sports Group. My understanding of impairment charges is when a company has something of value that they thought was worth one amount, but it was worth significantly less later.
So the broadcasting contract was worth $30 million dollars to them, but it’s worth nothing now. But as we have covered here, giving up their contract and going their own way is their more lucrative destiny. But in the financial world, the bird in the hand is worth more than two in the bush. Although in reality, the Fanduel spoiling fish in the hand is worth less than the three fresh BravesVision ones on a stringer.
Accounting methods are weird, and full of guesses, goodwill, and estimation. But bottom line, the Braves would be up 16 million dollars on 732 million dollars in revenue without the impairment charge. This is pretty good overall for a sports franchise.
The taxing 162 million dollar problem
Since the Braves are a publicly traded company, one of the advantages is that we can get better clarity into their financials. But that comes at a cost. Turns out, it’s easier to claim IRS tax writeoffs as a private-held company versus a public one. Per Investment News/Bloomberg:
Privately held teams like the New York Mets, owned by Point72 Asset Management founder Steve Cohen, and billionaire John Middleton’s Philadelphia Phillies, won’t get hit by the tax. The Mets, for example, can deduct every dime paid to outfielder Juan Soto, a free agent lured from the New York Yankees with a record-setting $765 million, 15-year contract.
[Atlanta]’s five most generously compensated players are set to collectively earn $96 million in 2027 — the year the new rule limiting salary deduction for all but $1 million of each of the top five most highly compensated players’ pay.
That amounts to a potential $19.1 million tax hike on the Braves, assuming a 21% corporate tax rate. The team paid $4.2 million in federal income taxes in 2024, according to a regulatory filing.
Terry McGuirk was asking in a winding question about this issue. He said that the Braves know which “162M issue” that was asked. He declined to comment, saying that the Braves are weighing their options on how to proceed. They have been lobbying Congress on this issue, but analysts feel this may be unsuccessful.
Ticket sales are very robust
Per the Braves:
Heading into the 2026 season, we were encouraged by strong ticket demand, having already sold more than 1.9 million tickets across seasons, groups, hospitality packages, and single-game inventory. Our premium clubs continue to be sold out, and there is a robust wait list on all season product offerings exemplifying one of the most sought-after season ticket memberships in MLB…
I believe the 2026 premium options (the club seats, private boxes, and suites) were already sold out in October. But the Braves did update us, saying that these are booked solid. On top of that, they have sold 1.9 million overall tickets for 2026. That’s over 57% of the inventory before the season has started. That’s also 23,170 tickets per game sold, which is around 3500 fewer attendees than in 2025. Seems like even after the reported price hikes, fans are buying as if 2025 was a fluke.
Total number of tickets sold doesn’t necessarily tell you everything about revenue, as I reported three months ago:
It would be helpful if you’re trying to put a valuation on the stock if you knew what the price per ticket is, especially since most of their income comes from ticket sales. But I don’t think it’s as easy as average ticket price anymore.
Sports teams are able to price the premium seating behind home plate, in the suites, and in the club level differently. You can raise much more money from this clientele that the rest of us. The New York Knicks make more profit from a floor seat than some entire sections of the regular seating. So it doesn’t make sense to compare the two.
BravesVision revenue won’t show up in financials until next quarter
The Braves announced BravesVision the day before they announced earnings. It’s almost like they expected to get a lot of questions about it. They did tell us that the revenue won’t be reported until Q2, aka three months from now. The BravesVision release did announce a lot of questions, though. However, cable viewers are left in the lurch for the time being. But they could announce cable deals this week, so stay tuned.
Parking and concerts matter, everybody
The Braves took a lot of stick for purchasing Pennant Park. This was not great timing of optics after being pretty quiet in free agency. And then in April, the Braves were terrible out of Opening Day and Jurickson Profar was suspended for PEDs. But honestly, it was the right move. If they want to increase their earnings, they have to buy and enhance properties. They need to collect rent and charge for parking. Truist Park is in one of the busiest places in Atlanta. Parking is at a premium, and the Braves are there to collect.
From the Braves:
Our mixed-use development revenue was $97 million in 2025, a $30 million increase from $67 million in 2024. This was primarily driven by a $27 million increase in rental income due to new lease commencements and in-place leases acquired with Pennant Park and to a lesser extent, sponsorship and parking revenue… Our tenants collectively achieved a new annual sales milestone of approximately 137 million across just 30 doors, which we believe ranks among the most successful mixed-use operations… In 2025, we welcomed nearly 9 million visitors to the battery, mostly in line with our levels from 2024, even as baseball attendance was softer last season.
The Braves are a baseball club and also practically a real estate investment trust. Don’t make me tap the sign. It’s boring, but mixed-use development is where they profit the most. And to be honest, they could double their hotels, shops, restaurants, and parking outside the ballpark and still have room to grow.
Event hosting on the Braves’ properties is strong. They said there were 380 total events and concerts in 2025. And of these 147 were held at the Coca-Cola Roxy, 144 on the common areas, and 95 Truist Park events.
Banana Ball is a gold mine
The row of revenue known as “other” increased 25% this year. Per their statement, “Other revenue increased primarily due to an increase in events held at Truist Park, including concerts and other special events such as hosting two games for the Savannah Bananas.” They made $9 million more through special events at Truist Park. The Savannah Bananas were in town for two games. This May, they are back for three games.
Debt up yearly, down quarterly
The Braves paid off 21 million dollars in debt this last quarter. Their long term debt is up slightly more than 10 million dollars. Pennant Park cost the Braves 93 million. If you assume the Braves debt obligations are 21 million in a three-month period (as is the case with fixed payments), they have made 84 million dollars in debt payment this year. They did this without touching their revolving debt (kind of like a line of credit) and actually pay it down by 25 million.
So they effectively made almost one Pennant Park-sized property worth of debt payments this year. They appear to have the head room for more purchases. Another way to look at it is that in seven or so years, they can be debt-free. With zero debt payments, they could have pay 84 million dollars worth of players.
Braves look to be strong financially overall
Eleven percent revenue growth is great. They had the headroom to increase the payroll, and they’ve done it. They may not be done (please don’t be done, please don’t be done) and if they aren’t, they have the funds to cover it. I’m excited to hear about BravesVision and the numbers behind that. Also, the back-of-the-envelope math suggests that divisional round playoff home games are worth around 7-8 million. You know, just in case the Braves are looking for more revenue growth opportunities.