Formula One’s parent company, Liberty Media – controlled by billionaire mogul John Malone – reported higher third-quarter earnings of $268 million, up from $168 million in the year-ago period. In addition to Formula One, Liberty Media also owns the Atlanta Braves of Major League Baseball and SiriusXM.
For their part of the third quarter report, Formula One turned a 2017 third-quarter loss of $10 million into an operating profit of $39 million during this year’s third quarter.
“We’re sort of foundation building and, as we go through 2019, we also expect 2020 and 2021 to also be steps forward,” commented Liberty Media’s F1 boss, Chase Carey.
Carey added that Liberty Media is still in negotiations with race team owners on a new Concorde Agreement – which governs how the sport is run – with the current contract expiring in 2020 and that Formula 1’s current live streaming offering won’t be fully marketed and commercially sold until 2019 after technology and content issues are resolved.