Vivid Seats closed FY22, its first full fiscal year as a public company, with net income of nearly $71M, a major jump from the $19.1M loss in the preceding fiscal year. That is a good sign for the Chicago-based secondary ticketing marketplace, whose SEC filing this morning indicated that post-pandemic ticket sales tailwinds are beginning to subside and the industry beginning to return to more normalized trend lines. Vivid’s gross order value (the total transactional amount of marketplace orders) was up 33% year-over-year to $3.2B, while revenue was also higher from FY21, climbing 35% to $600.3M, both company records. Vivid, which went public via a SPAC deal in 2021, heads into FY23 with cash on-hand and debt headed in opposite directions. The company listed $264.9M in net debt, down from more than $460M a year ago, while cash and cash equivalents is $251.5M. Sports ticket sales revenue dropped 11% year-over-year, though concert ticket sales rose 7%. Vivid's filing highlighted its rebrand of Vivid Picks, its in-app daily fantasy sports offering. Vivid Picks increased both monthly active users and new accounts created by close to 300%, and recently unveiled the in-game capability in Q4.
