Simon H:

josfen01:

"As of March 31, 2012, we had total indebtedness of £423.3m. Our indebtedness increases the risk that we may be unable to generate cash sufficient to pay amounts due in respect of our indebtedness. It could also have effects on our business." The debt could "affect our ability to compete for players and coaching staff; limit our flexibility in planning for, or reacting to, changes in our business and the football industry; [and] increase our vulnerability to general adverse economic and industry conditions" - (quoted from document filed by United's owners, the Glazers, to the US Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday.) This is the Glazers publicly conceding – after seven years of denials from them, Sir Alex Ferguson, the manager, and the chief executive, David Gill – that the £423m debt loaded on the club by the US-based family when buying it in 2005 "increases the risk" of their ability to operate it as competitive business. This is what we as UNITED supporters have been stating all these years!!!!

This just shows we have been taken for mugs. All this b.u.l.l.s.h.i.t that we have money for our tragets, no value in the market blah blah blah. The Glazers, Gill and to a point SAF have treated us like fools.

Simon H:

steersyutd:

LAW:

I thought this message board was for fans not representatives from the Club? Sorry but the situation has gone far beyond this type of official response having any impact on any fan whose eyes are even partially open. Everyone knows that the club can no longer compete in the transfer market with our main competitors. The slide has already begun (Wayne Rooney will be on his way soon after the promise made to him to compete at the top end has clearly been broken) and when Alex retires it will become unstoppable (if you read the listing document closely this has finally been acknowledged). When I think of the amount of money that has been paid out to service debts over the past few years and what we could have done with it in the transfer market and for ground development, it breaks your heart and as a lifelong United supporter makes me very angry at the owners and their apologists.

Show me in the listing where 'this has finally been acknowledged'?

See josefen 01 comment.

steersyutd:

Even though you have written that great post, it will not stop a lot of posters reading to much in the listing. We already have people saying 'its in black and white, The glazers have admitted we are in trouble' I just wish people would read and understand things just a tad better.

RealRY is largely correct that many of the secrecy rules afforded the Glazers in such as Delaware and to some degree even in the UK, is purely down to the fact that the company is privately owned. Therefore once the IPO goes through we should be able to find out much more about the state of play on things.

The incouraging thing has always been that the club has managed some of it's greatest partnership deals in recent times 'despite' the global recession and as the debts are brought down I can only now see the position becoming stronger (in the world as we currently know it that is).

FFP 'will' have some impact on our competition which will be somewhere between what Uefa/fifa and what the sceptics are claiming but with our revenue potential over the next few years together with this small to medium potential impact on our cheating competitors we should soon see an evening out on the transfer competition stakes.

josfen01:

"As of March 31, 2012, we had total indebtedness of £423.3m. Our indebtedness increases the risk that we may be unable to generate cash sufficient to pay amounts due in respect of our indebtedness. It could also have effects on our business." The debt could "affect our ability to compete for players and coaching staff; limit our flexibility in planning for, or reacting to, changes in our business and the football industry; [and] increase our vulnerability to general adverse economic and industry conditions" - (quoted from document filed by United's owners, the Glazers, to the US Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday.) This is the Glazers publicly conceding – after seven years of denials from them, Sir Alex Ferguson, the manager, and the chief executive, David Gill – that the £423m debt loaded on the club by the US-based family when buying it in 2005 "increases the risk" of their ability to operate it as competitive business. This is what we as UNITED supporters have been stating all these years!!!!

steersyutd:

LAW:

I thought this message board was for fans not representatives from the Club? Sorry but the situation has gone far beyond this type of official response having any impact on any fan whose eyes are even partially open. Everyone knows that the club can no longer compete in the transfer market with our main competitors. The slide has already begun (Wayne Rooney will be on his way soon after the promise made to him to compete at the top end has clearly been broken) and when Alex retires it will become unstoppable (if you read the listing document closely this has finally been acknowledged). When I think of the amount of money that has been paid out to service debts over the past few years and what we could have done with it in the transfer market and for ground development, it breaks your heart and as a lifelong United supporter makes me very angry at the owners and their apologists.

Show me in the listing where 'this has finally been acknowledged'?

bevninja:

steersyutd:

What amazes me is that you have been given a valid reason how and why the PIKS have been paid off yet still do not believe it. Strange.

The reason for the company being listed in Delaware is probably the same reason you and I would not want all our financial records splashed across every blog and media outlet. The Glazers have always been very close guarded on there businesses, Man Utd is no different. Why should us mere mortals have access to the information in the first place?

Some of us are just interested in discussing the various possibilities.

Where the company was listed before Delaware still kept it away from ordinary prying eyes. The laws currently in Delaware allow even more to be kept locked away in the cupboard.

And now we are in the Caymans as well, bit of a theme going on.

LEE TREVIS:

pele 10:

Thanks for the bump earlier LEE.

I wonder if manoob is going to contribute this time.

Just one question before I leave. Didn´t they reach this point before they stopped the IPO in Hong Kong? I agree with what was said earlier about using a smaller listing to test the waters.

Hiya Pele, no probs on the mention, you did do the work on that one afterall matey ;)

I think they've gone a little further down the road this time Pele, I don't see them backing out of this one, as I was saying to Steersy my take on it is pretty much explained in my larger post on page 2, taking note of the Facebook IPO to some degree, it is quite possibly all about final value perception.

LEE TREVIS:

steersyutd:

The reason for the company being listed in Delaware is probably the same reason you and I would not want all our financial records splashed across every blog and media outlet. The Glazers have always been very close guarded on there businesses, Man Utd is no different. Why should us mere mortals have access to the information in the first place?

Hiya Steersy, the holding company-sub company model is much the same as many if not all big business structures tbf and is usually done to manipulate tax costs, it may also have the advantage as you say of hiding certain dealings that some of their other interested parties/businesses may not like to see.

The Glazers are quite uniquely in the position where they own two large fanbased businesses, us and The Buccs, as such IF they did use the money they took out of The Buccs the other year to pay towards our club's situation then would have been in a position where they would have satisfied some of our fans but enraged the Buccs fanbase, so to be able to hide that aspect of their dealings would have been very wise.

This is just one of many possible advantages to them.

I posted a rather indepth analysis of what I made of the morning news on page 2 of this thread but the lack of response may well be due to it's size me things, I will have to take a note from old Brian Clough's book and "Keep it simple, stupid" in future eh lol :D

pele 10:

Thanks for the bump earlier LEE.

I wonder if manoob is going to contribute this time.

Just one question before I leave. Didn´t they reach this point before they stopped the IPO in Hong Kong? I agree with what was said earlier about using a smaller listing to test the waters.

I think they've gone a little further down the road this time Pele, I don't see them backing out of this one, as I was saying to Steersy my take on it is pretty much explained in my larger post on page 2, taking note of the Facebook IPO to some degree, it is quite possibly all about final value perception.

LEE TREVIS:

steersyutd:

The reason for the company being listed in Delaware is probably the same reason you and I would not want all our financial records splashed across every blog and media outlet. The Glazers have always been very close guarded on there businesses, Man Utd is no different. Why should us mere mortals have access to the information in the first place?

Hiya Steersy, the holding company-sub company model is much the same as many if not all big business structures tbf and is usually done to manipulate tax costs, it may also have the advantage as you say of hiding certain dealings that some of their other interested parties/businesses may not like to see.

The Glazers are quite uniquely in the position where they own two large fanbased businesses, us and The Buccs, as such IF they did use the money they took out of The Buccs the other year to pay towards our club's situation then would have been in a position where they would have satisfied some of our fans but enraged the Buccs fanbase, so to be able to hide that aspect of their dealings would have been very wise.

This is just one of many possible advantages to them.

I posted a rather indepth analysis of what I made of the morning news on page 2 of this thread but the lack of response may well be due to it's size me things, I will have to take a note from old Brian Clough's book and "Keep it simple, stupid" in future eh lol :D

I wrote the exact same thing in the large FFP thread last week with regards to dealings with The Bucs, the point was proven several weeks ago when a thread was created on here slating the glazers for investing in the Bucs but not actually understanding that no money had actually been paid.

Even though you have written that great post, it will not stop a lot of posters reading to much in the listing. We already have people saying 'its in black and white, The glazers have admitted we are in trouble' I just wish people would read and understand things just a tad better.

there is a video in the link , which is a little intresting...

bevninja:

steersyutd:

What amazes me is that you have been given a valid reason how and why the PIKS have been paid off yet still do not believe it. Strange.

The reason for the company being listed in Delaware is probably the same reason you and I would not want all our financial records splashed across every blog and media outlet. The Glazers have always been very close guarded on there businesses, Man Utd is no different. Why should us mere mortals have access to the information in the first place?

Some of us are just interested in discussing the various possibilities.

Where the company was listed before Delaware still kept it away from ordinary prying eyes. The laws currently in Delaware allow even more to be kept locked away in the cupboard.

And now we are in the Caymans as well, bit of a theme going on.

LAW:

I thought this message board was for fans not representatives from the Club? Sorry but the situation has gone far beyond this type of official response having any impact on any fan whose eyes are even partially open. Everyone knows that the club can no longer compete in the transfer market with our main competitors. The slide has already begun (Wayne Rooney will be on his way soon after the promise made to him to compete at the top end has clearly been broken) and when Alex retires it will become unstoppable (if you read the listing document closely this has finally been acknowledged). When I think of the amount of money that has been paid out to service debts over the past few years and what we could have done with it in the transfer market and for ground development, it breaks your heart and as a lifelong United supporter makes me very angry at the owners and their apologists.

steersyutd:

The reason for the company being listed in Delaware is probably the same reason you and I would not want all our financial records splashed across every blog and media outlet. The Glazers have always been very close guarded on there businesses, Man Utd is no different. Why should us mere mortals have access to the information in the first place?

The Glazers are quite uniquely in the position where they own two large fanbased businesses, us and The Buccs, as such IF they did use the money they took out of The Buccs the other year to pay towards our club's situation then would have been in a position where they would have satisfied some of our fans but enraged the Buccs fanbase, so to be able to hide that aspect of their dealings would have been very wise.

This is just one of many possible advantages to them.

I posted a rather indepth analysis of what I made of the morning news on page 2 of this thread but the lack of response may well be due to it's size me things, I will have to take a note from old Brian Clough's book and "Keep it simple, stupid" in future eh lol :D

steersyutd:

bevninja:

LEE TREVIS:

bevninja:

As I understand it that sum of 400m does not include some of the debts which during restructuring have been 'legally' hidden away, so the absolute total debt is something a little over 643m.

The debt won't be written off any time soon, this IPO will make no real inroads on that.

The best we can hope for is a reasonably successful IPO and that hopefully when the cost of the IPO itself has been factored in the rest goes to pay off some of the debt.

Hiya Bevninja, as you know I was/am a suspecter of further debts hidden in Delaware, however it appears that there is no mention of them in this new IPO listing and they are indeed referencing the debts at £423.3 million.

The thing is seeing as we don't have any proof of this hidden debt or, if it exists, what it's magnitude is we really can't hang to much on it.

As Pele 10 showed in a previous financial thread it could be argued just as speculatively that the PIKs or a large part of them were indeed paid off as it can be shown that at and around that time the Glazers did cash in on several large investments and draw cash out of other businesses in their portfolio.

It can be said though that the Glazers are clearly continuing with the usual holding company-sub company chain structure which makes the paper-trail all the more difficult for the likes of us to follow, so it's impossible to ever really know what's in the closet.

Watcha Lee, yep it's all starting to take off again, I suspect there's a lot going on with the restructuring in Delaware, the one question you have to ask is, Why do that at all? there was no real reason other than to continue to muddy the waters even further. Now we appear to be being owned by a holding company in the Caymans!! Don't share the view that the Piks have just gone away entirely.

But as we know the Glazers make the FBI look transparent!

Just have to hope that after the not inconsiderable cost of the IPO itself we're able to pay off some of that debt.

What amazes me is that you have been given a valid reason how and why the PIKS have been paid off yet still do not believe it. Strange.

The reason for the company being listed in Delaware is probably the same reason you and I would not want all our financial records splashed across every blog and media outlet. The Glazers have always been very close guarded on there businesses, Man Utd is no different. Why should us mere mortals have access to the information in the first place?

No PMSL accidents today steersy. Thanks for the bump earlier LEE.

I wonder if manoob is going to contribute this time?

Just one question before I leave. Didn´t they reach this point before the Glazers stopped the IPO listing going progressing in Hong Kong? I agree with what was said earlier about using a smaller listing to test the waters.