ALL issues relating to the bond issue and club finances

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fredthered said:
If I shut my eyes and dont look at the total debts attached to United, then I think I can see what Roodboy is on about.....
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Progress :D

Now Fred, I do also understand where you are coming from and yes it is clear that the club has a high amount of debt - I have said many times that I would feel more comfortable with a lower level of debt myself. But all I have been trying to demonstrate is that even though we have a high annual interest bill, we also make more than enough profit to cover that and still have money (in my opinion more than enough but that is open to argument) left over to invest in the squad. Plus, although it has not happened yet, there does seem to a plan in place to stop the total debt from increasing and in fact start to bring it down.

I am not saying that the Glazers ae good for the fans or that things are better than before or anything like that. I am just trying to analyse where we stand today and my conclusions are that things are not so bad and could definitely be a lot worse.
 
roodboy said:
Progress :D

Now Fred, I do also understand where you are coming from and yes it is clear that the club has a high amount of debt - I have said many times that I would feel more comfortable with a lower level of debt myself. But all I have been trying to demonstrate is that even though we have a high annual interest bill, we also make more than enough profit to cover that and still have money (in my opinion more than enough but that is open to argument) left over to invest in the squad. Plus, although it has not happened yet, there does seem to a plan in place to stop the total debt from increasing and in fact start to bring it down.

I am not saying that the Glazers ae good for the fans or that things are better than before or anything like that. I am just trying to analyse where we stand today and my conclusions are that things are not so bad and could definitely be a lot worse.
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time to start ignoring him I think. He doesn't want to understand because he can't see past his hate. There are forums where he could spout his drivel and everyone will lick his ring. I suggest he spends his time there.
 
A1Dan said:
Well that's pretty much the point I was making ages ago, but you are just flip-flopping to whatever suits you.

On the one hand you say that we shouldn't be looking at proft and loss figures that include non-cash items, as it's all about whether we have cash.

But now you're telling me that cash flow isn't relevant and we should look at the long-term financial picture, which is precisely why accounts include non-cash items such as amortisation of player registrations, taxes etc.

Make your mind up!
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Ive never said anything of the sort - if you are just going to make things up then there isnt much point in discussing.

And I am not one to 'flip-flop' around - if anything I am overly anal in sticking very rigidly to the point in question and get frustrated when others dont.
 
roodboy said:
Progress :D

Now Fred, I do also understand where you are coming from and yes it is clear that the club has a high amount of debt - I have said many times that I would feel more comfortable with a lower level of debt myself. But all I have been trying to demonstrate is that even though we have a high annual interest bill, we also make more than enough profit to cover that and still have money (in my opinion more than enough but that is open to argument) left over to invest in the squad. Plus, although it has not happened yet, there does seem to a plan in place to stop the total debt from increasing and in fact start to bring it down.

I am not saying that the Glazers ae good for the fans or that things are better than before or anything like that. I am just trying to analyse where we stand today and my conclusions are that things are not so bad and could definitely be a lot worse.
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That depends on what you call bad...

I would conjecture that having our club indebted to the banks to the sum of hundreds of millions of pounds so Glazer can have the club for nothing, is about as bad as it gets.

Just because they have managed to get United to cover their costs, doesnt paint much of a silver lining in my books.

The was I see it its a two case scenario

They run up a debt and United can afford to pay it

They run up a debt and United cant afford to pay it.

Of the two, naturally the first is preferable but its certainly never going to be a "good" situation to be in.

My problem is what happens if scenario A becomes Scenario B
 
roodboy said:
Ive never said anything of the sort - if you are just going to make things up then there isnt much point in discussing.

And I am not one to 'flip-flop' around - if anything I am overly anal in sticking very rigidly to the point in question and get frustrated when others dont.
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You took the words right out my mouth.

:D
 
roodboy said:
Ive never said anything of the sort - if you are just going to make things up then there isnt much point in discussing.

And I am not one to 'flip-flop' around - if anything I am overly anal in sticking very rigidly to the point in question.
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roodboy, I read in the latest financial release that, the club have benefitted from variances in the currencies in terms of UCL media income, they're talking about the depreciation of the pound against the euro aren't they? If that's the case, our income from that avenue will dip if the pound recovers, I know that might be offset by the money we may save from transfers for European players but how big an affect will it have on our revenue growth?
 
The only interesting thing there is that the PIKS have not been touched which is probably why there is such a lot of cash sloshing around (waiting for 31 July or whenever they can hit them).
 
peterstorey said:
The only interesting thing there is that the PIKS have not been touched which is probably why there is such a lot of cash sloshing around (waiting for 31 July or whenever they can hit them).
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So Peter, you think that they will go after the PIKs this year? Wasn't there an article stating recently that the Glazers had no plans of touching the PIKs this year?
 
RedRichio said:
Fred, you are a bitter, sad, obsessed and ultimately wrong man. Please cock off. It's boring.
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RedRichio said:
time to start ignoring him I think. He doesn't want to understand because he can't see past his hate. There are forums where he could spout his drivel and everyone will lick his ring. I suggest he spends his time there.
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In case you hadn't noticed, this thread is for discussing issues related to our financial situation. If you find that boring I'm sure there's plenty of other thigns you could be doing with your time, but please don't come in here telling others to get out, especially not in such an offensive way.

I don't know what sort of forum you envisage where you just ignore anybody who doesn't hold the same opinions as you, but to Fred and Roobdoy's credit they are clearly happy to debate their differences.

If you just want everybody to agree with you, I'd suggest that it's you who should find another forum where everybody can "lick your ring" and spend your time there. That way this one can be left to the grown ups and everybody's happy.
 
Roodboy is anal

Redrichio likes talking about rings being licked..

I see a picture forming....
 
Devil_forever said:
So Peter, you think that they will go after the PIKs this year? Wasn't there an article stating recently that the Glazers had no plans of touching the PIKs this year?
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If that is the case and they dont touch the PIKs then theres going to be some very very irate people wanting to know just what the feck is going on.
 
A1Dan said:
In case you hadn't noticed, this thread is for discussing issues related to our financial situation. If you find that boring I'm sure there's plenty of other thigns you could be doing with your time, but please don't come in here telling others to get out, especially not in such an offensive way.

I don't know what sort of forum you envisage where you just ignore anybody who doesn't hold the same opinions as you, but to Fred and Roobdoy's credit they are clearly happy to debate their differences.

If you just want everybody to agree with you, I'd suggest that it's you who should find another forum where everybody can "lick your ring" and spend your time there. That way this one can be left to the grown ups and everybody's happy.
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Look, you question, debate and learn and offer something to the debate. Fred doesn't, because he doesn't want to hear. He offers nothing to this thread and I don't see the point in going around in circles with him. I don't agree with some of what you conclude but it's an opinion reasonably deduced from the available information rather than agenda driven drivel.
 
Devil_forever said:
So Peter, you think that they will go after the PIKs this year? Wasn't there an article stating recently that the Glazers had no plans of touching the PIKs this year?
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I did see something like that but I didn't believe a word of it. They can't pay them down right now so they made a virtue of having the cash on hand.
 
RedRichio said:
Look, you question, debate and learn and offer something to the debate. Fred doesn't, because he doesn't want to hear. He offers nothing to this thread and I don't see the point in going around in circles with him. I don't agree with some of what you conclude but it's an opinion reasonably deduced from the available information rather than agenda driven drivel.
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Just like for the last 5 years you have maintained the Glazers owning United isnt a problem, and that the debts were easily manageable, we'd have mega money spent on players and everything was all hype.

5 years later, we now see hardly any money has been spent on players, other than what we've sold to pay for them, and the debts are growing all the time, as are the interest payments.

But still you just pass it off as an "agenda"

if theres anyone whos not prepared to take on board the information at hand, its you.
 
peterstorey said:
I did see soemthing like that but I didn't believe a word of it. They can't pay them down right now so they made a virtue of having the cash on hand.
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But hang on, that money is for players... David Gill keeps telling us that.

Either the money in the bank is for players, or its for the PIKs.. It cant be for both..

or case 3 - David Gill is talking out his arse...
 
fredthered said:
Unless I am mistaken, when you prepare a business plan, you look at whats going to come in, whats going to go out, and you formulate a plan of action..

Now quite rightly, you mention the money coming in is what they projected.

Sadly, the money going out somehow doesnt match because they havent had to spend half of what the planned for.

So the money coming in is what they said it would be
THe money in the bank is what they said it would be
The debt is about the amount they projected it would be
But they havent spent what they said they would spend.

Unless you can dress up a credit agreement in a United top and stick him as a centre forward, then I would guess that what they said they would spend on players isnt being matched. That money is going elsewhere.
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It's sitting in United's bank account, Fred, that's where it is.

Did my point about the Ronaldo sale taking place just 11 months ago and that it therefore wouldn't be wise to draw any kind of conclusion about the level of Capex under the Glazers ownership given the extraordinary nature of that sale, just fly completely over your head?
 
fredthered said:
But hang on, that money is for players... David Gill keeps telling us that.

Either the money in the bank is for players, or its for the PIKs.. It cant be for both..

or case 3 - David Gill is talking out his arse...
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You'll probably spend £50/60M on players this summer with only about £20M cash going out this year. The rest will go to the PIKS. Gill will say: Told you there was money for transfers.
 
fredthered said:
Just like for the last 5 years you have maintained the Glazers owning United isnt a problem, and that the debts were easily manageable, we'd have mega money spent on players and everything was all hype.

5 years later, we now see hardly any money has been spent on players, other than what we've sold to pay for them, and the debts are growing all the time, as are the interest payments.

But still you just pass it off as an "agenda"

if theres anyone whos not prepared to take on board the information at hand, its you.
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Except of course I never said that. Nice try though. Another of freds facts.
 
peterstorey said:
You'll probably spend £50/60M on players this summer with only about £20M cash going out this year. The rest will go to the PIKS. Gill will say: Told you there was money for transfers.
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That fecker should get a job for the Labour Party. He makes Alistair Campbell seem almost believable.
 
GCHQ said:
It's sitting in United's bank account, Fred, that's where it is.

Did my point about the Ronaldo sale taking place just 11 months ago and that it therefore wouldn't be wise to draw any kind of conclusion about the level of Capex under the Glazers ownership given the extraordinary nature of that sale, just fly completely over your head?
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So if it wasnt in the bank, where would hte money that they said they'd spend on players come from ? You know, the £30 odd million they budgeted for...

And if they'd spent the £25 million a season they budgeted for, what would the bank account look like ?
 
fredthered said:
That depends on what you call bad...

I would conjecture that having our club indebted to the banks to the sum of hundreds of millions of pounds so Glazer can have the club for nothing, is about as bad as it gets...
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Well that is your problem Fred - you are still fixated on events from 2005 and the fact that the Glazers managed to pull off an LBO in the first place.
It is time to move on.
 
A1Dan said:
Can you understand how this all adds up to sounding a lot like explaining stuff away?

It's a constant stream of...

"The club only reported profits of £25m after selling Ronaldo":nervous:

"Oh, that's because of amortisation of Goodwill, it's the cash position you need to worry about.":D

"Phew. Hang on, We're £55m down in cash over the last 9 months!":eek:

"Oh, don't worry about that, it's seasonal and there were some legal fees".:D

At the end of the day, it's all sailing very close to the wind, and needs a constant stream of financial analysis to explain why it's not actually going tits up.

This from a club that, in essence, should be clearing a profit of tens of a millions of pounds, despite being able to spend big on players if required, and without worrying about a single red figure on the books.
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A ''constant stream of financial analysis'' is surely exactly what we need if we want to discover the reality of United's financial position! Now maybe some people don't want to know that reality, but I know many people do and to my mind it therefore makes pretty good sense to continue analyizing United's finances.

Now to answer your question about the fall in cash, yes it really is because of seasonal cashflow and the bond issue legal fees. Now that's the reality of why it has happened, it's not ''explaining stuff away'' as you put it, it's actually recognising and stating the correct reason for why the cash balance has fallen since the last quarter.

If you look at the year to year comparison you'll note that the amount of cash is much higher at the end of March 31st 2010 than it was at the same point in the previous year.

The reason why the cash balance falls away from its position at the start of the year is because so much of the matchday revenue is received up front in April-June before the start of the next season.
 
roodboy said:
Well that is your problem Fred - you are still fixated on events from 2005 and the fact that the Glazers managed to pull off an LBO in the first place.
It is time to move on.
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I dont deny that I'll never ever accept that takeover.

Whatever happens, whether we make it financially or not, I'd be still fighting like hell to get them out.
 
GCHQ said:
Well, let's start by saying that player capital investment has nothing to do with and doesn't effect the level of EBITDA achieved (in accountancy terms anyway).

The net cash expenditure on players in the period since the Glazers takeover in May 2005 up to the end of March 2010 has been £57m. Now obviously that includes the quite extraordinary sale of Ronaldo for £80m 11 months ago. Given the extraordinary size of that fee (smashed the world record let's not forget) it would seem pretty daft to draw any definitive conclusion about the level of Capex on players under the Glazers ownership. Of course if you take that figure out of the equation you get a total outlay of £137m or roughly £27m a year. The average outlay in the three years before the sale of Ronaldo was £23m.

In short, we need to wait and see what the Capex is like over the next few years.

But none of that has anything to do with your point about how United isn't performing financially as well as the Glazers (and banks) had hoped.

Do you now agree that you were mistaken to think that?



Lunch-time
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You're saying that the net expenditure is £57 mill but most have been saying it's only £10 mill. I know it's a lot to ask but would you be able to post the individual fees of the players bought since the Glazers' take over?

Many thanks in adavnce.
 
roodboy said:
I think you are deliberately trying to play dumb here A1Dan - obviously the club has working capital requirements and has to spend money every month on wages etc - is that a suprise to you?

I wont actually have time to look at results until tonight/tomorrow so will reserve comment until then.
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Indeed. Does him no favours and I wouldn't say that it exactly lends itself to a ''sensible debate'' which I think is what this thread should be for.
 
Devil_forever said:
You're saying that the net expenditure is £57 mill but most have been saying it's only £10 mill. I know it's a lot to ask but would you be able to post the individual fees of the players bought since the Glazers' take over?

Many thanks in adavnce.
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I'm not going through individual fees. Most of them are ''undisclosed'' anyway. Vidic cost £8.4m for example and not the £7m that is widely quoted.

I've taken my figures from the club's/Red Football's accounts, specifically the net cash expenditure figures in every reporting period that there has been since the Glazers takeover.

All of those accounts are widely and freely available on the internet I believe.
 
GCHQ said:
A ''constant stream of financial analysis'' is surely exactly what we need if we want to discover the reality of United's financial position! Now maybe some people don't want to know that reality, but I know many people do and to my mind it therefore makes pretty good sense to continue analyizing United's finances.

Now to answer your question about the fall in cash, yes it really is because of seasonal cashflow and the bond issue legal fees. Now that's the reality of why it has happened, it's not ''explaining stuff away'' as you put it, it's actually recognising and stating the correct reason for why the cash balance has fallen since the last quarter.

If you look at the year to year comparison you'll note that the amount of cash is much higher at the end of March 31st 2010 than it was at the same point in the previous year.

The reason why the cash balance falls away from its position at the start of the year is because so much of the matchday revenue is received up front in April-June before the start of the next season.
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With all due respect GCHQ, but we've been hearing all this for 5 years now..

"oh the lack of spending is due to...."

"the debts rose because of...."

"the club shows a loss because...."

Every single time, theres some "justifiable" reason why things arent as bad as the accounts suggest.

At what point are people going to stop making excuses for them...

When they took over in 2005 the debt was £504 million ( of so ) and it went up.. Immediately it was all down to re-financing.. but things would pick up..

In 2007 the debts went up.. Again its down to re-financing. But hey.. the debts are cheaper so everything will work out fine.

Yes again, in 2010 we see the debts going up and once again, its down to re-financing..

The amounts payable are going up not down, the debts ever increasing....

Surely you must realise that people are getting sick of hearing that its "manageable" only for later on the need for further re-financing.

WHen they took out the bonds issue the story was that it allowed them to clear off the PIKs.. Now it appears they arent going to do that..

So what next ? More re-financing.. more payments..

When does it all stop.
 
peterstorey said:
You'll probably spend £50/60M on players this summer.
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I really don't see us doing that.

The amount of negative talk from Fergie about big signings has got it to the stage where there's hardly even any major transfer rumours about us gaining any strength, which is very unusual.

Maybe it's all a brilliant bluff by Fergie, and an Aguero or the likes is on the phone to Cheshire estate agents as we speak, but I'd be surprised.
 
A1Dan said:
I really don't see us doing that.

The amount of negative talk from Fergie about big signings has got it to the stage where there's hardly even any major transfer rumours about us gaining any strength, which is very unusual.

Maybe it's all a brilliant bluff by Fergie, and an Aguero or the likes is on the phone to Cheshire estate agents as we speak, but I'd be surprised.
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Fergie's been known to talk a lot of shit when it comes to transfer dealings though. Always hard to read him.
 
GCHQ said:
I'm not going through individual fees. Most of them are ''undisclosed anyway''. Vidic cost £8.4m for example and not the £7m that is widely quoted.

I've taken my figures from the club's/Red Football's accounts, specifically the net cash expenditure figures in every reporting period that there has been since the Glazers takeover.

All of those accounts are widely and freely available on the internet I believe.
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That £8.4 mill, does that include agent fees etc or just the fee paid to his former club? I only asked for an individual breakdown because net spend is something people go on and on about on here and it's the chief example of choice, to say that we're "skint".

I'd appreciate it if you could during any free time you have but I'd understand it if you didn't want to. Thanks anyway.
 
fredthered said:
With all due respect GCHQ, but we've been hearing all this for 5 years now..

"oh the lack of spending is due to...."

"the debts rose because of...."

"the club shows a loss because...."

Every single time, theres some "justifiable" reason why things arent as bad as the accounts suggest.

At what point are people going to stop making excuses for them...

When they took over in 2005 the debt was £504 million ( of so ) and it went up.. Immediately it was all down to re-financing.. but things would pick up..

In 2007 the debts went up.. Again its down to re-financing. But hey.. the debts are cheaper so everything will work out fine.

Yes again, in 2010 we see the debts going up and once again, its down to re-financing..

The amounts payable are going up not down, the debts ever increasing....

Surely you must realise that people are getting sick of hearing that its "manageable" only for later on the need for further re-financing.

WHen they took out the bonds issue the story was that it allowed them to clear off the PIKs.. Now it appears they arent going to do that..

So what next ? More re-financing.. more payments..

When does it all stop.
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Fred, it's not about making excuses for them. It's about stating the reality of the club's financial position.
 
A1Dan said:
I really don't see us doing that.

The amount of negative talk from Fergie about big signings has got it to the stage where there's hardly even any major transfer rumours about us gaining any strength, which is very unusual.

Maybe it's all a brilliant bluff by Fergie, and an Aguero or the likes is on the phone to Cheshire estate agents as we speak, but I'd be surprised.
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I can't see it either.

The club keeps reiterating the fact that we've bought Diouff, Hernadez and Smalling - totalling some £20m.

I can't see us going and spending anything more than another £15m to be honest.
 
Devil_forever said:
That £8.4 mill, does that include agent fees etc or just the fee paid to his former club? I only asked for an individual breakdown because net spend is something people go on and on about on here and it's the chief example of choice, to say that we're "skint".

I'd appreciate it if you could during any free time you have but I'd understand it if you didn't want to. Thanks anyway.
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I'm reasonably sure that it was the fee paid to his club alone.

Can't you go through the individual ''reported'' fees by yourself? Aren't there websites showing this stuff?

In any case surely the most accurate information that we should use is the information included within the club's independently audited accounts?
 
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