Ratner's Yards Bonds Rated 'Barely' Investment Grade
On the heels of last week’s eminent domain ruling, Forest City Ratner took another step towards realizing its vision for a basketball arena in Brooklyn when Moody’s Investor Service gave the $500 million in tax free bonds being used to finance the Barclays Center a crucial investment-grade rating. According to a largely positive story in…
On the heels of last week’s eminent domain ruling, Forest City Ratner took another step towards realizing its vision for a basketball arena in Brooklyn when Moody’s Investor Service gave the $500 million in tax free bonds being used to finance the Barclays Center a crucial investment-grade rating. According to a largely positive story in Crain’s yesterday afternoon, “the Baa3 rating reflects several factors, including the strength of New York City as a media market, existing sponsorship support for the team, the large amount of equity the developer and its partner are putting in the project and strong reserve funds.” And check out this quote in The Times from a vice president at Moody’s: The lawsuits are not an issue as far as the rating is concerned. The rating assumes that the lawsuits will be settled and that the project will move forward.” A more skeptical article in the New York Observer noted that while technically investement-grade, the bond rating was only one step above junk level, reflecting significant risk factors like relocation, weak team finances and “uncertain demand for premium seating.” And Atlantic Yards Report points out that the Moody’s rating assumes 225 events per year but Ratner’s on record as predicting only 200. Crain’s says that bond sales are expected to begin sometime this week.
New Nets Arena Wins Another Court Challenge [NY Times]
Moody’s Gives $500M in Nets Bonds Thumbs Up [Crain’s]
Nets Arena Wins Needed Bond Rating, Mostly [Observer]
Atlantic Yards Debt Gets Rated [The Bond Buyer]
More traffic congestion? You betcha.
-The area is served by mass transit and commuter rail lines. A percentage of fans will use these means to travel to and from games. Will there be traffic? Yes. Will people adapt? Certainly. Madison Square Garden, in a more heavily congested area, seems to do fine.
Jobs for community residents? None and longer term jobs will be seasonal and minimum wage.
– The arena will also create economic opportunities for retailers large and small who can develop innovative products/services/locations that rely on fans attending games. The quality of that retail may be open to debate, but one thing is certain – that economic activity does not exist in this area presently.
A community whose health as reflected by a strong real estate pricing and projects?
-Healthy for whom? People who can afford the market-rate housing or the luckier-than-you, never-gonna-move rent-control, rent-stabilization forces that inhabit the area? Because no one outside of these two groups would be able to afford to live in the area even before the arena project began.
> Really? it makes no sense???? or are you just being
> pig-headed for fun?
The point is that it should never have been part of the deal.
> $0 taxes < $0 (for 25yrs) + Lots of taxes (after 25yrs)
Or, something else gets built during those 25 years that does pay taxes. An even better equation, no?
“Sorry, your argument that it is somehow good that the arena does not pay taxes for 25 years makes no sense. Fill those coffers as soon as they start doing business, not 25 years from now.”
Really? it makes no sense???? or are you just being pig-headed for fun?
I think you can see that it makes perfect “sense” – If your argument is that other development (that would pay more total taxes) would have taken place anyway – that is valid argument (one I do not agree, but at least intellectually valid) or if you oppose AY for other reasons fine – BUT unless your math skills are at a pre-K level you can certainly understand that
$0 taxes < $0 (for 25yrs) + Lots of taxes (after 25yrs)
TWO HUNDRED EVENTS PER YEAR that will apparently generate no tax income for the city for 25 years…
TWO HUNDRED EVENTS PER YEAR. Oh my god. Please, this is not about basketball.
> Why would anyone risk investing in a city ruled by communists?
You heard it hear first, folks. Billionaire Bloomberg is a Communist!
> but it isnt evasion, since it is part of the deal – and a
> good one at that I might add…
Sorry, your argument that it is somehow good that the arena does not pay taxes for 25 years makes no sense. Fill those coffers as soon as they start doing business, not 25 years from now.
“In the everyone-is-a-special-snowflake world of Brooklyn”
Havelc;
You are a breath of fresh air on this site!!!!! Excellent!!!!!!
Polemiscist– if only the city were run by Communists! I’m only half joking, because in Denmark we are run– pretty much– by Communists… the only advantage is that at least someone is in charge. If the city wants to build a public works project or a soccer stadium, they figure out a way to do it (involve the community better than the AY people), figure out something sensible and do it.
The biggest problem with the AY project is how no-one is in charge. There are years of lawsuits, fights and problems over stuff that should have been ironed out in a few months.
In a socialist country you would have gotten the Frank Gehry design and gotten it a year and a half ago.
In the everyone-is-a-special-snowflake world of Brooklyn, you get years of fights, millions of dollars wasted on legal fees and years of bad will built up as thousands of people became bitter over a long fight… you STILL end up with a stadium, just a crappier one which will cost the same amount.