SeaWorld Parks attendance up 5.3% in 2011

Posted | Contributed by Jeff

SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment, the Orlando-based owner of 10 theme parks across the country, appears to have rebounded from a two-year slump. The company's top executive told the Orlando Sentinel on Tuesday that attendance across the chain climbed 5.3 percent in 2011 — to about 23.6 million visitors in all. It is the company's first year-over-year increase since 2008.

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"SeaWorld also plans to borrow an additional $500 million to pay a dividend to the Blackstone Group, the New York-based private-equity firm that bought the company in a leveraged buyout in 2009. When coupled with a $110 million payment that SeaWorld made to Blackstone last year, the new dividend would mean Blackstone has recouped nearly two-thirds of the $975 million in cash it put up to buy SeaWorld from beer brewer Anheuser-Busch InBev."

How long until the sale/IPO of SeaWorld Parks, after which it will limp along flirting with bankruptcy thanks to the heavy debt load courtesy of Blackstone?

Last edited by hambone,

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