Madison Square Garden Entertainment Corp. (NYSE:MSGE) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Devin Brisco: Thanks. And as your cash balance grows beyond returning capital to shareholders through debt paydowns and repurchases, how big of an appetite do you have for M&A?

Dave Byrnes: We always evaluate opportunities that make strategic and financial sense for us. But right now, we’re not currently planning to acquire any additional venues or other entertainment properties. We’re currently focused on the venues we have in our portfolio and maximizing their utilization and profitability.

Ari Danes: Thanks, Devin.

Dave Byrnes: Thanks, Devin.

Ari Danes: Operator, we’ll take one last caller.

Operator: And your final question comes from the line of David Joyce from Seaport Research Partners. Your line is open.

David Joyce: Dave, could we drill down some more on the topic of residencies? I was wondering how that’s shaping up by the various venues in your portfolio. And how should we model the range of number of events per artist going forward? And finally, related to residencies, are there operational efficiencies from booking these? If you could just help us think about the economics from this aspect that would be helpful. Thank you.

Dave Byrnes: Sure, David. We’re in discussions with a number of acts for potential residencies at all of our venues. And we’re seeing that the appetite for residencies from artists is growing considerably. For them, residencies mean less travel and less wear and tear on the band. We’re also seeing increased demand as artists and promoters recognize that they can play our venues for an extended period of time and sell out over the run. Just a few examples. In recent weeks, we hosted Phish for seven nights at the Garden, and Ali Wong for six nights at the Beacon. Ali Wong is one of several comedy residencies that we have slated for fiscal ’24, Matt Rife set for six shows at Radio City in February, and Trevor Noah, nine nights planned at the Beacon in October.

I’d also add, one of our strength is our — clearly, our great relationship with artists and management. So we’ll continue to leverage these relationships to attract top talent to our venues for more exclusive recurring program with, again, the goal of increasing utilization across our venues.

David Joyce: Great. Thank you very much.

Dave Byrnes: You’re welcome.

Operator: And this concludes our question-and-answer session. Mr. Ari Danes, I turn the call back over to you for some final closing remarks.

Ari Danes: Thank you all for joining us. We look forward to speaking with you on our next earnings call. Have a good day.

Operator: This concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.