Liberty Media Corp. proposed splitting off the business that houses SiriusXM and combining it with the rest of Sirius XM Holdings Inc., the latest reshuffling of billionaire John Malone’s sprawling business empire.
Liberty already owns about 83% of SiriusXM, the audio entertainment company that includes the Pandora music streaming platform and satellite radio. Liberty’s Sirius XM shares are held in a tracking stock.
“Liberty’s proposal rationalizes the dual corporate structure between LSXM and SiriusXM,” Chief Executive Officer Greg Maffei said in a statement Tuesday. “SiriusXM minority shareholders will also benefit from enhanced trading dynamics, including increased liquidity and likelihood of future index inclusion.”
SiriusXM shares fell about 10% in premarket trading, while Liberty’s tracking stock rose 11%.
Liberty said it would seek to separate Liberty SiriusXM through a redemptive split-off of a newly formed subsidiary of Liberty, which would own all of the assets and liabilities attributed to the current tracking stock.
Current shareholders of the tracking stock would receive shares in the new company, according to the release. The minority shareholders of SiriusXM would own about 16% of the new unit and former shareholders of the Liberty SiriusXM tracking stock would own about 84% of the combined company.
Malone has sprawling investments in video, broadband and communications assets, including Warner Bros Discovery Inc. Liberty Media runs the Formula One racing circuit and earlier this year, completed its split-off of the Atlanta Braves baseball team into a separate, publicly traded company.
