LAS VEGAS, NV — The Athletics on Friday unveiled a $1.75 billion financing structure for their planned Tropicana-site ballpark that team president Marc Badain called “a completely new instrument,” and which finance professionals identified within roughly six seconds as bonds.
Under the plan, buyers of “Seat Equity Tokens” will receive fractional exposure to the ballpark’s future ticket revenue, redeemable in 2038 at a fixed lump-sum payment. The Athletics’ press release referred to this arrangement as “on-chain” seven times, “revolutionary” four times, and “a bond” zero times.
The offering document, a 94-page PDF hosted on a website that briefly redirected to a defunct FTX help page, explains that the tokens will trade on a permissioned exchange operated by a Cayman entity whose sole officer is also the team’s assistant general counsel. Projected yield is 6.4%, roughly in line with an A-rated muni, and slightly lower than what sportsbooks two blocks away were paying Friday on the Dodgers to win the West.
“This isn’t debt,” said Trell Kavaris, chief structuring officer at Mesa-Ridge Digital Capital, standing beside a poster board of the token’s logo that had been mounted slightly askew. “It’s participation. It’s community. It’s a claim on future cash flows secured by a specific asset with a fixed redemption date. Which, and I want to be very clear about this, is not a bond.”
The Athletics have committed to accepting three stablecoins for token purchases, including one that traded at $0.71 as recently as March. Season-ticket holders were offered a “loyalty discount” of 40 basis points, delivered as a separate token that cannot be sold, transferred, or, according to the FAQ, “understood at this time.”
A spokesperson for the Nevada Gaming Control Board, reached at a Wahoo’s on Sahara, said the agency was “aware of the filing” and had “some questions,” pausing to add hot sauce. The commissioner’s office declined comment, though a person familiar with the discussions said Rob Manfred had, upon reviewing the term sheet, asked twice whether this was “just bonds.”
The first tranche is scheduled to close during the club’s home opener on April 24, with buyers receiving a commemorative NFT of the seat they did not purchase and a physical certificate that a team employee confirmed will be printed on regular paper at the Kinko’s near the front office.
Institutional interest has been limited. A managing director at a mid-sized Ohio pension fund, eating a chopped salad at his desk, said he had reviewed the deck for eleven minutes before forwarding it to compliance with the subject line “lol.” Retail interest has been more robust: the token’s Discord grew to 41,000 members by Friday afternoon, most of whom appear to be under the impression they are buying actual seats.
The Athletics play their home games this season in Sacramento.