I know you weren't complaining GM, but plenty do. They say they feel disconnected with the club because of the corporate stuff. I reckon without the corporate stuff we could be languishing down with Liverpool, or worse.
ALL issues relating to the bond issue and club finances
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Time to put a poster of Uncle Malc up on my wall. Uncle Malc holding aloft the PL trophy.
I wonder if the superstore can sort me out...
I wonder if the superstore can sort me out...
Do you know though it's certainly interesting going back looking at old threads from 2004 - 2010 where it was all hate, like hate with real venom. That does seem to have pretty much all dried up.
I am interested to know if people are just bored with it and have moved on or has their stances genuinely changed?
I am interested to know if people are just bored with it and have moved on or has their stances genuinely changed?
Quite a few of those will have probably left or been banned since.
I hated him, spoke out about it, joined SU, all the rest of it. Now I still think fan ownership of some form is desirable, tho there needs to be debate about what would work. But I also think Glazer has been vindicated in terms of believing our commercial potential was not being realised. I felt he took a big gamble with the club, and it was a gamble, but he understood better than most how strong his hand was. He seems to have made it work despite a financial crisis he can't have foreseen. So fair play to him for that.
I still wonder what'll happen to the money we are earning. Above it says it doesn't matter how successful we are in the short term. I hope he doesn't cream the money off for his family, or to support struggling businesses in the US, and reinvests to ensure we maintain our success. I still don't really trust him as he's just a capitalist pure and simple with no real affinity for the club or football generally. But so far what he's doing is working and we're thriving so I guess we just have to wait and see. I can't fault his business acumen as far as his ownership of United is concerned, that's for sure.
I still wonder what'll happen to the money we are earning. Above it says it doesn't matter how successful we are in the short term. I hope he doesn't cream the money off for his family, or to support struggling businesses in the US, and reinvests to ensure we maintain our success. I still don't really trust him as he's just a capitalist pure and simple with no real affinity for the club or football generally. But so far what he's doing is working and we're thriving so I guess we just have to wait and see. I can't fault his business acumen as far as his ownership of United is concerned, that's for sure.
A lot of those people have moved on from United for various reasons.
I think you're second paragraph rings so true. Once the dept is paid off I don't expect 120m to be ploughed back into the club on top of what we spend now because I'm not that naive, but I would love to see a decent percentage of it go towards development and possibly subsidizing ticketing. If they are in it for the long run then these things have to happen.
Anyone leaving a club over ownership is a strange one. Sure, don't spend money there, campaign for change, but don't abandon the club!
Yeah it's just that simple isn't it.
Imagine someone growing up in Manchester, 3 generations of family all immersed in the history of the club, season tickets.
With the greatest respect who the feck are you to lecture lifelong reds on what they should do.
That doesn't sound respectful at all!
I'm not lecturing anyone at all dude, I just think that if I grew up in Manchester and came from 3 generations of match going supporters I don't think I could just walk away completely due to the owners. Maybe I could stop going to games and putting money in their pockets but I couldn't stop watching games or keeping an eye out for the score. Not sure why you would get your knickers in a twist over that??It varies I suppose, there are still those with the hate but less than a few years ago.
The worst fears (that we would end up ruined like Leeds, the ground would be sold, underinvestment in the squad would mean no trophies etc) that people had back then been proven to be unfounded over time - it has been shown that the business plan works and the worst period of highest debts seems to be behind us.
That is not to say that there arent still negatives about their ownership, but on the finance side all is moving in the right direction.
Whats next though? Another float or a partial sale? Do they hold onto the club and continue they we're going? The next five to ten years will be very telling.
For the sake of fairness, life long red or not, nobody has the right to lecture another on what they should do. But we all can have opinions
I would expect more shares to be sold at some point, but I think they will retain a significant stake for the long term
For the sake of fairness, life long red or not, nobody has the right to lecture another on what they should do. But we all can have opinions
Especially given that I hadn't lectured anyone. But then I'm not from Manchester so I should shut the feck up and mind my own business.
Our fate is in the hands of our owners, just like City, Chelsea, Liverpool, Spurs or Arsenal's fate. That has always been so.
But United are in by far the strongest position financially. The debt was never as threatening to the future of the club as fans believed, and it has now shrunk to practical insignifance. The business model has worked well - we're hugely profitable, and on course to make even more money in the future. So there's good reason to be optimistic.
The Glazers could still decide to demolish OT, and construct a multi-storey car park, of course, but it's not very likely. They'll probably continue to run United as a business, investing enough to keep the club at the top of world football, without forgetting the bottom line of ever increasing profits and valuation.
Latest quarterly results are announced on Thursday.
good time to give a reminder of how the share price has moved since float ...
https://marketdata.nyse.com/JTic?app=JPV&rf=GIF&cs=368x300&style=NY2&VOLUME_SCALE_IS_TITLE=FALSE:TRUE&fq=D&ezd=1Y&id=Man Utd&cred=l8bCBrn1yOi2LSb2VhwRw558DNBCUlW2XtJfEInYMtMHct3dWAzT1Q.opg21PqKOo4uKtznUqChX3Ca6phY8wOm4hXIBljeoPpGh/5zbh9tqeKpry7KDYW
https://marketdata.nyse.com/JTic?app=JPV&rf=GIF&cs=368x300&style=NY2&VOLUME_SCALE_IS_TITLE=FALSE:TRUE&fq=D&ezd=1Y&id=Man Utd&cred=l8bCBrn1yOi2LSb2VhwRw558DNBCUlW2XtJfEInYMtMHct3dWAzT1Q.opg21PqKOo4uKtznUqChX3Ca6phY8wOm4hXIBljeoPpGh/5zbh9tqeKpry7KDYW
I'm not at all knowledgeable on finances and economics in general. I have a question to those of you who do though. The answer to my question will always be speculative at best, but here goes:
How much can the Glazer leveraged buy-out be blamed for increased ticket prices, and how much can be attested to the general evolution of the sport? (ie other teams prices have also gone up)
The reason I ask is because now that the Glazer family seem to have been vindicated to some extent when it comes to the way they run the CLUB financially, the main gripe with fans ought to lie in the elevated ticket prices causing people not to afford their season tickets etc.
Did that make any sense?
How much can the Glazer leveraged buy-out be blamed for increased ticket prices, and how much can be attested to the general evolution of the sport? (ie other teams prices have also gone up)
The reason I ask is because now that the Glazer family seem to have been vindicated to some extent when it comes to the way they run the CLUB financially, the main gripe with fans ought to lie in the elevated ticket prices causing people not to afford their season tickets etc.
Did that make any sense?
For the Glazers it has.
For the club it has been a huge drain on resources. They have taken 550mil out to pay for their debts they put on the club. I know that no matter who owns the club there has to be a payout(unless you have a sugar Daddy) but it does seem very high.
In the end it seems to be all working out but it doesn't takeaway from the fact that with proper regulation we would never have been in this mess in the first place.
Its something that can never really be evaluated.
People on one side will say its all down to the leveraged buyout and without it prices wouldnt have gone up as they have.
The glazers would argue that , given we are not the most expensive in the premier league by a long shot, tickets have risen in line with the overall market and there is nothing extraordinary about them.
The truth is probably somewhere in the middle but its just impossible to ever say with any certainty.
When they first took over, the Glazers initially put up prices faster than usual and that was probably linked to the LBO. However for the past few years there has been little to no rise at all most years, so looking at it over the 7 years since they took over I think that our prices rise have been pretty standard when you compare to other PL clubs and also look at historical price rises under the PLC.
A seperate issue on affordability is the Automatic Cup Scheme which is actually much worse for ST holders than any ticket price rise - I think only Arsenal have a similar scheme.
If you break the last 28 years into 7 year chunks then you get the last 7 years of the Edwards ownership, the first 7 years of the plc, the last 7 years of the plc and, finally, the first 7 years of the Glazers. Looking at the rates of price increases in the four periods for the cheapest and most expensive season tickets you get the following:
Edwards: Cheapest 95.7% (10.1 % p.a.); Most expensive 86.6% (9.3% p.a.)
First plc: Cheapest 83.0% (9.0% p.a.); Most expensive 135.9% (13.0% p.a.)
Last plc: Cheapest 57.9% (6.7% p.a); Most expensive 52.6% (6.2% p.a.)
Glazers: Cheapest 36.4% (4.0% p.a.); Most expensive 72.4% (7.0% p.a.)
(24.1% of the increase for the Most expensive seats under the Glazers applied for the 2005-06 season and had been announced before the take-over.)
Compared to our peer group of clubs and to our own previous ownerships, the Glazers have raised ticket prices at a significantly lower rate. Of course the ACS adds an extra burden for season ticket holders the impact of which depends on how many cup games the ticket holder would have gone to if the ACS hadn't been there.
If you look at the timing of the major ticket price increases in each period, it is apparent that prices were raised to pay for each of the major expansions of OT - and that prices never went down after the construction was completed.
Edwards: Cheapest 95.7% (10.1 % p.a.); Most expensive 86.6% (9.3% p.a.)
First plc: Cheapest 83.0% (9.0% p.a.); Most expensive 135.9% (13.0% p.a.)
Last plc: Cheapest 57.9% (6.7% p.a); Most expensive 52.6% (6.2% p.a.)
Glazers: Cheapest 36.4% (4.0% p.a.); Most expensive 72.4% (7.0% p.a.)
(24.1% of the increase for the Most expensive seats under the Glazers applied for the 2005-06 season and had been announced before the take-over.)
Compared to our peer group of clubs and to our own previous ownerships, the Glazers have raised ticket prices at a significantly lower rate. Of course the ACS adds an extra burden for season ticket holders the impact of which depends on how many cup games the ticket holder would have gone to if the ACS hadn't been there.
If you look at the timing of the major ticket price increases in each period, it is apparent that prices were raised to pay for each of the major expansions of OT - and that prices never went down after the construction was completed.
I'm assuming that you're not referring to our on-field performance as a "mess" (5 Prems and two 2nds in the last 7 years together with 3 CL finals, a WCC and sundry cups and shields), so you must be talking about the financial side. Hopefully you understand that mssrs Harris, O'Neill, Green and Drasdo were hell bent on making things look as bad as possible. The "550 mill" figure is an artifact of this. It's easiest to get at the reality by looking at cash flows in and out of the club over the 7 years from 2005 to 2012.
Total revenue: 1,856.144 mill
Player sales: 177.847 mill
Total Cash Inflow: 2,033.991 mill
Staff costs: 878.898 mill
Operating expenses: 384.397 mill
Net fixed assets: 89.561 mill
Player purchases: 294.867 mill
Total Cash Outflow: 1,647.723 mill
Difference: 386.628 mill
The "Difference" figure is essentially the operating surplus generated by the club. If we were still a plc both taxes and dividend would be paid out of that surplus. I estimate that the total of taxes and dividends over the period would have been around 240 mill; Green estimates the figure to be closer to 190 mill. In a spirit of compromise I'll split the difference and assume 215 mill. That leaves 171 miil that we have to account for. 5 mill went to increasing our cash reserve, so we are left with 166 mill that the Glazers are responsible for - not a small amount, but not 550 mill.
There are a couple of further twists to this story. There's an assumption hidden in there that, if we had continued as a plc, we would have generated the same revenues and, in particular, that the same growth in Commercial revenues would have occurred - even Green (andersred) has given up claiming that as likely. If the plc would have generated less revenue, the "cost of the Glazers" goes down from the 166 mill. But that might not be the most important impact.
The plc was wedded to the rule that player costs should be less than 50% of revenue. Without the immediate increase in commercial revenues - the shift to AIG and the increase in other sponsorships - that occurred after the LBO, salary growth would not have been possible within the constraint. In particular, it seems likely that we would only have been able to sign two of Evra, Vidic and Carrick - oops. Of course we'll never know what would have happened, but it's not inconceivable that a significant element of our on-field success was dependent on the growth of commercial revenues, and who knows what SAF would have done if he felt the board was not supporting him. Anyway, it's a good story and, before we get too busy condemning the Glazers, I suspect that a glance at the bigger picture might not be a bad thing. Blood sucking leeches vs. the saviours of our team????????????
Great analysis. I've copied and pasted that post into my 'United Finances' folder.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2013/apr/23/manchester-united-glazers-finance
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...r-uniteds-finances-if-not-hearts-8590748.html
http://espnfc.com/columns/story/_/id/1128842/richard-jolly:-manchester-united-ipo---q&a?cc=5739
The 550mil claim has been in a few new sources.
I don't hate the Glazers. There I've said it.
With Arsenal you get around 8 cup games with your season ticket so it's one big payment at the start of the season. I added the ACS payments up for this season and it's £300 If your in East/West T2. If you add another £700 for the season ticket your not far off from what Arsenal supporters pay at the start of the season.
Well, that can't be presupposed, obviously not. Then again what the old plc would've done had it carried on – is sheer conjecture no matter how you look at it. The assumption that they – the old plc – would have been incapable of expanding the “brand”, tapping into the Asian market, closing various deals with various sponsors...and all the rest of it, is equally spurious, surely?
It all depends on the status of the “brand” itself, doesn't it? United are a huge club with an enormous, world-wide fan base. This was true before the Glazers showed up, nobody will deny that. Now, sticking strictly to the business side of things, selling and expanding that “brand” is something a competent owner should be expected to do – or am I missing something?
What enraged fans at the time wasn't that we were taken over by astute businessmen. It was the form of the takeover itself. I sometimes get the feeling the Glazer apologists think a leveraged buyout is an ideal business model – and then proceed to prove this point by demonstrating how clever the Glazers have been in the market. That ain't logical – no matter how you twist and turn it.
Ravelston's analysis shows the real effect of the Glazer takeover i.e. the total amount of money that has flowed into the club over the last seven years, minus the amount that has been spent on the club itself - paying wages, buying players, maintenance of infrastructure etc. That figure is £381m.
He then calculates how much the plc might have been expected to take out of the club - based on the same figures - and estimates £215m.
So the Glazers have taken £166m more than the plc. might have been expected to take in the same financial circumstances.
Whether the plc would really have spent £24m more per year on wages and transfers is unknowable, but it is reasonable to claim, given the Glazers groundbreaking approach to commercial deals, that revenues and profits would have been lower under the plc., and that the Glazers have covered that £166m levy on the club by increasing its profitability.
I'm not arguing against the numbers. The Glazers aren't demons from hell who have destroyed our fine, old club – we can all agree on that. And it's quite possible the plc would have been less astute in the market. That remains conjecture, though. The plc were, in effect, a board – the balance of that board, who that board would've appointed to do exactly what, and so forth – is impossible to say.
My point is simple: The Glazers own this club as the result of a leveraged takeover. The form of the takeover was regarded as the main problem back then – and it still is, as far as I'm concerned: We don't know what their long-term plans for our club are – they may decide to remain in charge indefinitely, they may decide to up and sell once they've made enough of a profit (which is usually the idea behind a leveraged takeover). It's an unstable form of ownership, in short. And then you may say that a truly stable form doesn't exist to begin with – not once you've gone public. Which is true, of course. And in that light I'll be the first to admit the Glazers haven't been disastrous at all – thus far. And that it could've been far worse.
My point is simple: The Glazers own this club as the result of a leveraged takeover. The form of the takeover was regarded as the main problem back then – and it still is, as far as I'm concerned: We don't know what their long-term plans for our club are – they may decide to remain in charge indefinitely, they may decide to up and sell once they've made enough of a profit (which is usually the idea behind a leveraged takeover). It's an unstable form of ownership, in short. And then you may say that a truly stable form doesn't exist to begin with – not once you've gone public. Which is true, of course. And in that light I'll be the first to admit the Glazers haven't been disastrous at all – thus far. And that it could've been far worse.
Well they bought the Tampa Bay team back in 1995 and still own them right? We're worth a hell of a lot more to the Glazers than that team so I'm sure they would be here for the long haul.
I sure hope they do anyway, the last thing we would want is another takeover and then to be saddled with debt all over again.
I sure hope they do anyway, the last thing we would want is another takeover and then to be saddled with debt all over again.
You are absolutely correct - we can have no certainty of the outcomes had the plc remained in control. The evidence we have is supportive of a view that they were not very adept commercially, but that doesn't mean that they couldn't have improved. (There was zero growth in Commercial revenue over the seven years preceding the LBO. Indeed Commercial revenue in 2004 - two years after the Nike and Vodafone deals - was lower than in 2000 - two years before the deals. Go figure.)
Hasn't the debate been more in the context of viability rather than any sense of the "ideal"? An LBO is only likely to be viable in cases of excessive costs or under-utilised assets - in our case the latter. I'm guessing that at this point viability is no longer an issue (if it ever was) and I'm not sure that "cleverness" had a lot to do with it. As you said, it's something that a competent owner would be expected to do - and that the plc seemed to be incapable of - hence the opportunity for an LBO.
No - it's been quoted in a few more places. The source is always the same - Andy Green.
If this is all accurate then that's a significant step away from what's been floated before.
As Genius Me has observed, there is not now (nor ever has there been) any reason to view the Glazers' ownership as "short term". They used a lot of debt in their purchase of the Bucs in 1995 and it's never been suggested that they were in it for a quick profit. Why would you expect United to be any different?
I can't get the "Glazer cost" down below 40-50 mill no matter how bad I assume the plc might have been. However, if the 50 mill is viewed as the investment necessary to get the Chevrolet deal ...
Although I was a little flippant about it, I'm really quite serious about the extent that our transfer activity might have been affected by the 50% rule if we had remained a plc. I find the idea that SAF has been managing with one hand tied behind his back because of the LBO ludicrous. It is more likely that the LBO set free the hand that had been tied by the plc.
I don't expect it. I'm just saying that the model (using debt - which must be served - to purchase a football club) isn't ideal. Nor is it ideal to be owned by someone who has no interest in the historical institution that is Manchester United beyond what profit may be gained from selling the club as a brand.
I suppose the Glazers have been both astute and a bit lucky so far. To what extent they would have done anything to protect the interests of the fans if the ride had been less smooth - if their financial situation had made it harder for them to serve the debt without directly hampering the club, say - is anyone's guess.
Q3 results are out tomorrow if anyone is interested. Should be very interesting - hopefully will get the actual figures for the AON deal and how it is structured (any front loading for example).
CF call begins at 1 pm UK time. Will be on the IR pages for a month after as well so can listen to it at a later date if you are so inclined.
http://ir.manutd.com
CF call begins at 1 pm UK time. Will be on the IR pages for a month after as well so can listen to it at a later date if you are so inclined.
http://ir.manutd.com
Neither of us has any idea what level of interest they have in "the historical institution that is Manchester United". However, if their only interest was profit, I doubt that they would have paid in excess of 230,000 for Nobby Stiles' medals back in 2010. (And they might not have been so reluctant to sell OT naming rights.) [Edit: Plus, at least two Glazers at the Villa game would suggest some level of interest.]
Financially, it's hard to see how the ride could have been any less smooth. The near collapse of the financial system left them unable to refinance after 2006 - high cost debt and no easy way to get out from under the PIKs. Yet, despite all the dire predictions from Green and others, no financial issues affected the club and we have sailed calmly through the best seven year period we've ever had on the field.
How do "the interests of the fans" differ from the Glazers' interests? The value of their investment is dependent on the quality of the team they field; there's not much more that they could do with ticket prices; I suppose naming OT could have happened.
My memory is fading, but how much did the same of Ronaldo to Madrid in the aftermath of the CL defeat to Barca tie in with the ramping up of the green and gold campaign and the more widespread vocal objection to them? I know there was a lot of resentment that the 'Ronaldo money' was never pumped back in on new players.
Could have been totally different timing I honestly can't remember.
Could have been totally different timing I honestly can't remember.
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