As we're unlikely to see terraces again at football, this is the virtual equivalent where you can chat to your hearts content about all football matters and, obviously, Arsenal in particular. This forum encourages all Gooners to visit and contribute so please keep it respectful, clean and topical.
QuartzGooner wrote:Still do not understand it StuartL.
Not trying to wind anyone up, but to me it is just one rich person selling to another rich person.
As for the board members who sold, apart from Dein they look to me be in their seventies, and maybe they just feel the time is right to cash in?
The shareholders can, of course, sell to whoever they choose.
I guess for me, it's the way Hillwood insistsing that the club is in safe hands with Kronke as he share the clubs values (whatever they are now - fleece the idiots as much as you can ?) and is another "custodian" - while all I can see since his takeover is....... no investment in the team, price rises out of proportion with inflation and out of context to the quality of football on show, kits being changed every year for some excuse or another and our fans in general being treated like we should be greatful as "we are The Arsenal"
We have stopped acting with the class and dignity that we used to do - much to do with Wenger and his total disregard for the people who turn up week in and week out to watch inept and halfhearted displays from many of our players and his hysterical rantings at match officials, all the while not havng a bad word to say about abject performance week in week out.
Since Kronke has taken over what benefit has there been to Arsenal FC as a club ? (other than reaching 10milion fans on facebook now ?)
In 2004 you could buy one of our shares for £1700, today you would have to pay £16250. The numbers of shares hasn't changed sitting at 62,219.
This means in 2004 before the emirates move was financed the club was worth about £106m, now it is worth just over £1000m or a billion pounds.
This extra value is not down to greater success, greater sponsorship or outside investment. It is almost solely down to property value and increased profits due to a larger stadium capacity and a greater average cost to those tickets.
So the extra value of the company is based on the money that supporters have paid.
In effect the extra value of the company could have been re invested back into the club by means of a share issue. However the old board decided that they would allow the number of shares to stay stagnant, and let the share price increase, then sell and take the money out of the clubs and put it into there back pockets.
I appreciate your analogies and explanations, but straight up, I just cannot see it.
How share sales in themselves put money in to the club, or take money out.
I am either stupid (quite likely!), or thinking in a different frame of reference.
Sure, if cash is hoarded and not spent on players then it affects share price to the advantage of the seller, and it also cushions for the rainy day IF the money in the bank is spent when if needed.
If Usmanov or another now buys Kroenke's shares at a higher price than Kroenke paid for them, Kroenke makes a profit, clearly.
But cash does not come into the club from the sale, so how can it flow out?
The cash flows between Usmanov and Kroenke.
The club's bank balance and squad personnel and hence it's spending power remains the same before and after the sale transaction.
Only if the owner donates cash to the club, or lends it interest free, can money be said to be coming in from anything other than commercial revenues, prize money, ticket sales etc.
As much as anyone I want more of our cash to be used on player purchases, but Usmanov has not donated money to the club so far, so we can be encouraged but not certain he will live up to his talk of big spending.
Especially if Wenger is in charge of the purchases.
Last summer saw a bit more a spree than I anticipated after the Man Utd loss, let us see what happens this summer.
Ray (and the above others if this is what you meant)
I understand your point and thank you for taking the time to explain, it makes clear what others are saying about owners taking money out of the club (by what they did not do rather than by what they did).
But why would the owners make a new share issue?
It would not benefit them financially, only the club, and only benefitting the fans if the money was used for increased player purchases, or to keep ticket costs down.
It can only be an owner who is so rich he is using the club as a status symbol and competitive toy...rather like a racehorse owner.
No sign Kroenke will do this.
Talk of Usmanov wanting this type of arrangement, but he has yet to offer cash to the club outside of a new share issue.
A share issue that is unrealistic considering the reluctance of past and previous boards to offer one.
So was Usmanov's offer to back a share issue merely public relations knowing it would be refused, or something more potent signalling real intent to buy the club?
Quartz nobody is saying that these people are taking money from the club as such but what I am saying with absolute certainty is that the club being run on it's current format suits one man and one man only......kroenke. Not achieving success on the pitch means nothing to him as long as the balance sheets look good so whichever way you analyse it the good of kroenke is being put above that of the team Not taking the clubs money directly but by purposely not spending it he is ensuring a pot of gold for himself down the line and surely you can see that ?
Yes, I see what you mean now. Please see above post which was made just before you posted yours for fuller explanation.
I appreciate your analogies and explanations, but straight up, I just cannot see it.
How share sales put money in to the club, or take money out.
I am either stupid (quite likely!), or thinking in a different frame of reference.
Sure, if cash is hoarded and not spent on players then it affects share price to the advantage of the seller, and it also cushions for the rainy day IF the money in the bank is spent when if needed.
If Usmanov or another now buys Kroenke's shares at a higher price than Kroenke paid for them, Kroenke makes a profit, clearly.
But cash does not come into the club from the sale, so how can it flow out?
The cash flows between Usmanov and Kroenke.
The club's bank balance and squad personnel and hence it's spending power remains the same before and after the sale transaction.
Only if the owner donates cash to the club, or lends it interest free, can money be said to be coming in from anything other than commercial revenues, prize money, ticket sales etc.
As much as anyone I want more of our cash to be used on player purchases, but Usmanov has not donated money to the club so far, so we can be encouraged but not certain he will live up to his talk of big spending.
Especially if Wenger is in charge of the purchases.
Last summer saw a bit more a spree than I anticipated after the Man Utd loss, let us see what happens this summer.
I hope you're not being deliberately obtuse. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.
The Club are owned by a landlord. We are effectively a tenant. But we don't have freedom of movement. We can't move anywhere. We have to stay where we are. The Landlord is charging us well over the odds for an inferior product. We either should have a better investment in the Club on players or the rent / season tickets should be cheaper. The Landlord is uisng income produced by us to increase the value of his asset purely through cash reserves and pay down of debt. The asset is not getting better. He is adding no value. We are adding all of the value. So after years of being over-charged for an inferor product, do we then get a rebate or a massive refurnishment of the Club (big transfer budget etc)? No - the Club is sold on and the new owner has no money to invest in the Club as alll his money has been swalllowed up by buying out the previous owner. The purchase-up the rent - sell cycle is akin to a dodgy landlord taking advantage of a tenant unable to move. Cash doesn't physically come out as a dividend, but as a profit once sold on. There's nothing illlegal about it, but to claim that Kroenke is a custodian of the Club is about as big a joke as claiming that we're still a top side.
Yes I see your point, we were slightly talking at cross purposes but please see my previous post (10.35pm) for longer explanation of what I meant.
Was not being obtuse for a wind up, far from it.
But I think the conclusion drawn is that regardless of how rich the owner is, we need a "sugar daddy" business model to compete right now with where Man City and Chelsea are?
Or for all of our dross to be sold, and all new signings to hit the ground running, and for defensive and organisational coaching to markedly improve.
augie wrote:Quartz nobody is saying that these people are taking money from the club as such but what I am saying with absolute certainty is that the club being run on it's current format suits one man and one man only......kroenke. Not achieving success on the pitch means nothing to him as long as the balance sheets look good so whichever way you analyse it the good of kroenke is being put above that of the team Not taking the clubs money directly but by purposely not spending it he is ensuring a pot of gold for himself down the line and surely you can see that ?
The cynical way of looking at it is that Kroenke is ensuring a pot of gold for himself, but you could also argue that balancing the books is also a fairly good way of running a business, and is therefore for the good of the club.
We've definitely got a conservative board and manager and we don't have an owner who's willing to put his hand in his own pocket for transfers, but I don't have a problem with the club balancing the books.
Personally, I'm more concerned about how the money is spent (i.e. poor signings and high wages on average players) and that's down to Wenger. I think we've been very inefficient at times, and that needs to change.... and hopefully once the sponsorship deals are renegotiated, that money will filter into team building... but I'm not holding my breath
You could be right about Kroenke, but I don't think that's certain at this point. Only time will tell.
highburyJD wrote:I hate all those tax-avoiding non-dom scroungers
pay tax like everyone else in the country or piss off
Most have ,to Geneva Monaco and Singapore tens of thousands of high earning individuals have moved themselves and their companies too losing the UK Billions in the Taxes they and their employees pay .
The first thing to say is that the inflation of the share price was not purely the result of the club not spending. However, question that needs answering is whether or not this inflating of the share price was done knowing that team investment would suffer? Was cash hoarded and debt paid purely to push up share prices?
I'm inclined to give the club the benefit of the doubt, they were expecting a big profit from the highbury re-development which never materialised thanks to the financial crash. We can all be hindsight professors like USMartin and say the site should have been sold off, but if the board saw an opportunity to make a relatively quick profit for the club for very little risk (they still broke even in the end) then they'd be fools not to take it.
I dont know for sure but I'm inclined to think the club was committed to a debt repayment structure which assumed they could use the highbury proceeds to maintain squad investment.
LDB wrote:The first thing to say is that the inflation of the share price was not purely the result of the club not spending. However, question that needs answering is whether or not this inflating of the share price was done knowing that team investment would suffer? Was cash hoarded and debt paid purely to push up share prices?
I'm inclined to give the club the benefit of the doubt, they were expecting a big profit from the highbury re-development which never materialised thanks to the financial crash. We can all be hindsight professors like USMartin and say the site should have been sold off, but if the board saw an opportunity to make a relatively quick profit for the club for very little risk (they still broke even in the end) then they'd be fools not to take it.
I dont know for sure but I'm inclined to think the club was committed to a debt repayment structure which assumed they could use the highbury proceeds to maintain squad investment.
I totally understand the not selling the site issue so am not going against them on that at all. What I will argue is that it seems to be universally reported that the mortgage repayments are structured that we cannot pay off extra in advance so this practice of cash hoarding had nothing to do with debt repayment. What I can also say with absolute certainty is that we are making profits year after year and the accounts bear this out so therefore we were not dependent of property sales for our transfer budgets so why then has this money been hoarded ? In the absense of any proof to the contrary all we can go on is previous experience and it that regard we know that fizsman and the rest of the c**ts on the board made their financial killing last year on the back of these accounts
stg wrote:Can I just ask what would Usmanov bring to the table and what do you want him to do at The Arsenal?
A winning mentality - he is already quoted as saying on tv that he is not interested in making profits on his investment and that success is determined by winning trophies and medals He is the person that wanted a share issue to bring in an extra 100m for our transfer budget cos he wants us in a position to compete for the very best players. He actually attends matches on a regular basis unlike that yank who doesnt attend matches and rarely travels over so you can see straight away how little interest he has in the football side of our club.
What I want is a ruthless leader at AFC who will demand performances from all employees at the club from the manager down to the players. Too many people are on easy street in the club and are not held accountable from continued failures and I believe accountability would be a big thing with usmanov
havent read the posts on this thread but if it is saying get Usmanov in then I am in full agreement.
Wenger has achieved miracles in getting top 4 year after year but with money continuing to rule then the only way we can compete with the big 2 - Chelsea and Man City is to have someone prepared to invest more money into the squad and also someone with a winning mentality at the club. Kroenke doesnt understand that - he deals with US franchises where there is not the same attitude to winning.
Usmanov IN Kroenke OUT
if there are any planned demos then count me in
I totally understand the not selling the site issue so am not going against them on that at all. What I will argue is that it seems to be universally reported that the mortgage repayments are structured that we cannot pay off extra in advance so this practice of cash hoarding had nothing to do with debt repayment. What I can also say with absolute certainty is that we are making profits year after year and the accounts bear this out so therefore we were not dependent of property sales for our transfer budgets so why then has this money been hoarded ?
One possibility?
Whilst it would incur financial penalties to pay off the bonds early, the idea is that the total value of the repayments in held in the club's bank accounts so that if things go belly up on the pitch and with the economy the club does not default on the bonds and lose it's credit rating.
Other possibility?
Cash hoarded to force up share price ahead of sale of shares?
Or maybe both scenarios together?
As for property sales, please look at Swiss Rambler to see that in his opinion a very large proportion of our income has come from property sales, and so our transfer budgets have been dependent on property sales.
We do need to step up the commercial revenues.
I totally understand the not selling the site issue so am not going against them on that at all. What I will argue is that it seems to be universally reported that the mortgage repayments are structured that we cannot pay off extra in advance so this practice of cash hoarding had nothing to do with debt repayment. What I can also say with absolute certainty is that we are making profits year after year and the accounts bear this out so therefore we were not dependent of property sales for our transfer budgets so why then has this money been hoarded ?
One possibility?
Whilst it would incur financial penalties to pay off the bonds early, the idea is that the total value of the repayments in held in the club's bank accounts so that if things go belly up on the pitch and with the economy the club does not default on the bonds and lose it's credit rating.
quote]
Just gonna focus on that point quartz - would you not think that your highlighted suggestion is a bit moot considering that the likelihood of things going belly up would increase significantly if there was not enough investment in the playing squad ? Isnt that the reason that it is written into the financial agreements with the bank that the club has to apportion a certain % of income towards squad strengthening ?
Not taking the clubs money directly but by purposely not spending it he is ensuring a pot of gold for himself down the line and surely you can see that ?
He is the person that wanted a share issue to bring in an extra 100m for our transfer budget cos he wants us in a position to compete for the very best players. He actually attends matches on a regular basis unlike that yank who doesnt attend matches and rarely travels over so you can see straight away how little interest he has in the football side of our club.
