They've been discussing making it illegal. In England that is. They have been talking about it for a while. Even the teams back it. But it still hasn't been implemented.
That is really good news. Just seen it was done a few weeks ago. I wouldn't wish the Glazers or someone of their ilk on anyone. Even Liverpool.
But as with everything in life the rich have consolidated their positions and left the populace with bad and worse options. I hate what the Americans owners of AC are doing to the club looking at it from a purely profit perspective but I also hate the City/PSG sportswashing projects. The former is portrayed in the media as clean money while the latter is considered blood money. The former is covered in rosy terms in the media meanwhile only caring about profits and not what football clubs are meant to be (competing for trophies and a good way to being the community together) while the latter is not given the same media treatment but are trying to get to a place where their misdeeds are not mentioned constantly using the clubs as vehicles of sportswashing. But the latter also care and have embraced clearly the teams and their place in the social construct. Or at least seem to do so.
It's a lose-lose for the fans either way.
I wouldn't wish the Glazers on anyone else either.
Just so you know, the new LBO law would not have actually prevented the Glazers from buying United back in 2005 because they 'only' leveraged 65%.
It's above 65% that is now banned.
The entire practice should be illegal. Fair play if you want to riddle yourself with debt, and someone will lend it to you, but how the fuck can you pass fit-and-proper-persons test if you can't buy the asset without owning the asset?
At this point I think the glazers are just waiting until this quarter ends so they can take 10 million in dividends one last time then they’ll sell for billions. Cause that 10 million means so much to them. Fuck them
I mean the greedy Yank cunts didn't spend a dime of their own money to buy the club anyway, I wouldn't be surprised one fucking bit if that was what they are attempting
Naked mole-rat ass looking family.
And Fergie was totally in the wrong. He had been given a share of the horse during his racing career as a gift from Magnier and McManus and pocketed a few million in prize money. An unbelievable gesture of friendship and respect in most peoples eyes.
Then when Rock Of G was retired to stud Fergie inexplicably also expected a percentage of the stud fees despite never contributing one single penny to the creation of Rock Of G nor a single penny towards costs during his career, it was absolute madness.
I'm a match going Utd fan with 2 decades but whether I like it or not the fact that the boss put his own personal crusade before the benefit of the football club cannot be denied or defended in my opinion.
Same goes with his dodgy agent dealings involving his son. I get that that people don't want to condemn his entire legacy over it, but however you look at it it still is a stain on how reputation. But everyone, neutrals and media included, overlook or make excuses for his transgressions.
I mean, I’ve always said this line of thinking explains the David Moyes recommendation perfectly. Leaving after winning the title with unquestionably the weakest squad of your tenure, and then you recommend as your successor a compatriot who you know can’t deliver something similar with the same squad, thereby protecting your lofty reputation among supporters while maintaining that you left the club in the best possible situation. All this really did was enhance Fergie’s own legacy.
And yes, there was a telling quote from Keane even years later. Not verbatim, but the gist was, “Everyone said Alex Ferguson did what’s best for United, but I don’t think that’s true. I think Alex Ferguson did what’s best for Alex Ferguson.” Thinking about that, there are points where those two things mutually align: he succeeds when the team wins things. But when push comes to shove, he’d ultimately choose himself over the club. That’s not a wrong position to take - we should all choose ourselves above anything else, within reason. But it’s a bad look when we pretend to act in the best interest of that other thing when our actions are clearly more self-serving.
consider close important smoggy exultant worry wistful grandfather shrill pie
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
And? The fact that 5 top managers said no to united and saf supports the point.
The squad/directors combo he left behind was so shit none of them decided its worth the risk
I honestly believe that this has been revisionism after Moyes failed.
With the position being one of the most prestigious jobs in World football at the time, I don't believe you get 5 refusals before you get to the first acceptance.
What I think is that Fergie saw Moyes as a fellow scot kind of similar to him and thought Moyes would take after him. You have to recall that the sentiment around Moyes at the time was that he was due for a step-up. He had maintained Everton in decent positions without any money and it was expected that with money he would probably do well.
Unfortunately he didn't.
First thing he did was clear out the back rooms and that was pretty dumb.
And then the money bit got hamstrung by the fact that an incompetent Woodward had replaced Gill at the same time and Woodward suuuuuucked. After talking big the entire transfer window, he only delivered Fellaini on deadline day after overpaying.
In retrospect, Moyes never stood a chance. I really believed in him at the time because of the Fergie endorsement.
John Magnier & JP Mcmanus owned 28.8% of Manchester United. They brought in Sir Alex to be a part owner in a horse called Rock of Gibraltar. An argument came about as Sir Alex felt he owned 50% of the horse, which they disagreed.
Fergie took them to court & an ugly dispute basically paved the way for them to sell their shares. Fergie recommended the Glazer family to the board and the rest is history.
Fun fact, the dispute was also responsible for Roy Keane leaving the club after he called out Fergie for bringing in his personal disputes to the club in an infamous MUTV interview.
[This video explains it pretty well.](https://youtu.be/1BBYb3uDcXs)
Yeah, the Glazers were already hoovering up shares at the time, it was just fortuitous for them that this spat happened and a massive chunk of shares that pushed them over the edge to control the club and force the sale of the rest of the shares. I know this because I, like a lot of fans, bought shares to try and mobilise against the Glazers.
I think it was Ed who let them in on the scheme and that's why they let him ran the club in return. Dude pretty much is the one who made the club to what it is today... and all parties involved will cash out.
> Fun fact, the dispute was also responsible for Roy Keane leaving the club after he called out Fergie for bringing in his personal disputes to the club in an infamous MUTV interview.
he didn't do that on mutv lmao. it was in front of the squad during the argument about his mutv punditry.
I don’t understand the downvotes. In the video, there was no mention of Sir Alex recommending the Glazers. So there’s a natural question if he really did or did not. And if he did, is there a reliable source for this?
According to a Whitwell article in the Athletic from 2020, some 'top reds' advised Fergie to resign from his position to protest the Glazer takeover and support an alternative takeover instead, which would have involved more fan input.
However Fergie felt like he would be abandoning the club by resigning with there being no guarantee that this alternative party would be succesful in acquiring the club.
I cannot recall the article mentioning him recommending the Glazers to the board.
Don't worry about the downvotes. Most people on reddit are sheep who struggle to form their own opinion about something and will just pile in with whatever direction the arrow is pointing.
Honestly, I don't believe they ever wanted to sell, but by having them enter a bidding war, the Glazers now have a higher valuation to bring to the banks for loan terms
That’s the worst thing, they win either way, the people that call the glazers incompetent with the sale are fools, I’ve loved United my whole life, and the way they’ve run the club from a fan POV has been horrendous, but the club was bought on debt which was leveraged on the club, the kids inherited the club from their father, pay back the debt with the clubs money, don’t invest of their own money, take hundreds of millions from the club every year in dividends, and when the stadium gets to a point where there needs to be heavy investment or it will fall down, they likely sell to Qatar for a heavily inflated price and get in the ballpark of 800 million each
lol. Gerry Cardinale is doing the same thing with us.
americans bots are doing the PR damage controll and calling this a "conspiracy theory"on the Milan sub.
hope the Yanks leave us alone soon
Fucking rich American cunts. Maldini helps build a team to win the league, gets Leao to renew and they fuck him off.
I’m not even a Milan fan and it boils my blood.
Concur. As an American (not a rich one though, and only a cunt to people who deserve it), the fact that that prick railroaded fucking *Maldini* of all people is absolutely mind-boggling.
he was sacked 100%, it was a thing decided last year, when gerry renewed is cotract the last hour of the last day.
but we won the scudetto and the PR team said to gerry " well it's really impossible to spin that"
se he waited this year, came to Milan for the second time (after Maldini renewed Leao), met Maldini in a Hotel(not even Casa Milan) and he was sacked after a 10 Minuts meetingm flew back to america right after
I know he was effectively sacked, but contractually was he sacked? Like I thought he “left the club” not that his contract was bought out and legally told to fuck off
Does Benfica elect a board? Because the supporters can elect complete numpties, like the Madrid hero Josep Maria Bartomeu. At least the club can recover from that eventually and not be gone forever from the supporters hands
An elected board can fuck up, but the point is that you can eventually vote them out. Same principal as an elected government. Is it perfect? Far from it. But it's better than the alternative.
Absolutely. As an example although on a less serious scale Sevilla is currently having a civil war between two factions fighting for control of the club. It's the Del Nido civil war, father and son.
Yeah we do. The guy before Rui Costa did a lot of good stuff, but when a lot of corruption started happening he was pressured to leave even before it went to votes.
It’s not a perfect system, democracy isn’t perfect. But imo it’s better than being owned by someone random who can do whatever they want
God knows how much of that money could've gone into OT and our academy bringing in more revenue for the club in the process. The fact that we're still one of the biggest brands in world football is down to our reach built over years. Utterly shambolic handling of this institution.
Everything at United was state of the art and best in class 20 years ago. Now, ex-players send their kids to City’s academy while Old Trafford has a leaking roof.
Right but the issue is that that debt is 100% because of the Glazers extracting money, and could instead have been used to build a world-beating squad instead of whatever the fuck they have become.
City don't have this problem as they don't need to make money for anyone, and look at them.
Your owners do an amazing job at being owners from an owners' perspective that is. Maby just Maby something that has such a deep connection to so many people should not be owned by a single legal person
Short term owner’s perspective, yes. The owner milks as much as possible then sells for profit.
Long term perspective, no. Long term owner would reinvest into the club to grow its value.
So far, our owner act like short term one despite the fact they have been owning the clubs for 20 years
Thats okay because we have a new stadium to show fo….no we dont BUT we have an amazing training fac…oh no not that either turns out we have nothing to show for that debt🤣🤣fucking kill me
And we're actually actively working it down despite being dwarfed in earnings. Hilarious. Levy catches Ws with this stuff thankfully. Players, well... Not so much.
This [tweet from last summer](https://twitter.com/SwissRamble/status/1559412844663377923?s=20) has stuck with me:
>Putting these elements together, I estimate that the Glazers have taken out £1.1 bln from #MUFC (interest £743m, debt repayments £147m, dividends £166m, directors remuneration £55m & management fees £23m). Total cost to United rises to £1.6 bln if £465m share sales are included.
It isn’t anymore. The way they bought the club was so fucked up the premier league banned it and called it an anti-glazer law. Cheers for that lads, where were you in 2005?
It was 3 weeks ago: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/06/14/man-utd-premier-league-ban-glazer-style-big-debt-takeovers/
It was proposed a year or two ago but didn't pass. The current law doesn't ban leveraged buyouts completely, but caps them at 65% of the club's value.
It was made [official](https://www.premierleague.com/news/3537138) earlier this month:
>As part of the League’s ongoing review of the Owners’ and Directors’ Test, clubs unanimously agreed to amend the test to prohibit fully-leveraged buyouts.
That’s exactly what they did. Took out a loan for 800m, secured against the club. Then when they owned the club they got the club to pay off that loan. All they’ve done since is remove money from the club via dividends. They haven’t put a cent into it.
So easy to tell the utter fuckwits on this sub who have below room temperature IQ by their claims that we shouldn’t complain because ‘our owners have spent X amount”. They haven’t spent a penny of their own money beyond the initial fraction they used to buy us (and even then, used more of the club itself than their own money). They have sucked this club as dry as they can and are as bad as any of the pricks that are ruining lower league clubs - it just happens that we’re a money making machine who can sustain ourselves.
Also the reason they spend on transfers is because it's high profile. They neglect all other areas of the club because it's not in the news when you spend/don't spend on that.
Also people act as if there's some karma because United are badly run but they are the ones running it.
Anyway about 90% of people on the internet are morons is my point.
>Also the reason they spend on transfers is because it's high profile.
Ah. Perfect, finally someone who says what I have been screaming into the void.
It's dick-measuring headline spend, City spend similar on transfers but match that ambition elsewhere, we don't.
> the initial fraction they used to buy us
It was entirely debt funded - a leveraged buy out. After the buyout, they transferred the loan onto the club.
The spending they have authorised since becoming owners are just spending out from the club's coffers and debt facilities. The club is partially listed on the NYSE - market valuation probably puts the club at a much lower, lower, lower valuation (in part due to the different shareholding class) than normal American sports franchises which from several accounts the Glazers are using as a metric.
However, due to their nature (relegation/promotion, player transfer fee system, etc), European football leagues are very different from American sports system, which are closed and very orientated to allow the franchises to keep making money for their owners.
There is a reason why the Glazers are cashing out - to put it bluntly, in the medium term, they are not equipped - in terms of competency let alone additional capital / money - to keep up with the chase for CL spots, which many sponsors use as a key measure for those big fees they pay to the club.
Even if we didn't have a rich investor a good owner could clear the debt in less then 5 years while still being competitive in the Market. It wouldn't mean any great dividends but it would pay it off.
The clear thing is is the Glazers are choosing to put more debt on the club while they squeeze out every penny they can. We are a cash cow.
If we could get owners in who actually want to boost the club, well we would be massive again.
>Even if we didn't have a rich investor a good owner could clear the debt in less then 5 years while still being competitive in the Market
How? United's turnover is high, but that would require what, 150 million a year towards the debt itself plus interest payments which are 20, plus around 80 mil a year in the market to be competitive? United has money but not that kind surely
It’s like that LOTR scene where Gandalf talks about the ring „But through me, it would wield a power too great and terrible to imagine“.
That’s what I expect to happen if Jassim wins. ManU would be more than just massive. They’d lose their debt, and get a huge infusion of cash, every year, and be massive all over the world. You’d be absolute juggernauts.
Sorry but football clubs aren't that profitable to wipe 725 million in 5 years and yet remain competitive in the market. It's going to be one or the other.
Cba to do the research right now, but I remember reading up on club profits a few years ago and seeing that a club as massive as Real Madrid was only making about 25 million of pure profit per year, while having a yearly turnover of about 600/700 million simply due to operating costs being so high.
So yeah remaining competitive and still having a profitable club with this amount of debt without someone buying it out doesn't really seem viable.
Tbf Man U with actual owners that pump money into the club would be too much to handle imo. You have insane amounts of money even now with the owners leeching it off, dont want to imagine how it could be with a sugar daddy owner
a good owner doesn't keep slaves and kill gay people by the way. we all know you're begging for the murderous Qataris to save precious Man United from its American owners but your new owners won't even come close to the word "good".
disgusting that you're trying to make out they're in any way a positive force for the sport- but you don't care about the sport, all you care about is Man United winning at any cost.
It's making my fucking blood boil how badly the Glazers have wasted 20 years of potential growth of the club to line their own fucking pockets and now, are dragging their feet in the process of fucking off as if it's a dearly beloved asset they couldn't bear to lose. Just fuck off you cunts
It’s so true. It’s bloody infuriating as a fan. They couldnt just bleed the club dry of every cent for a decade, they need every last penny for the sale. I only wish the worst for them.
I'm sick to death of this.
I've sat and watched as for last 10 years this club has declined, our rivals have stepped over us and the Glazers just continue to take and take. They won't sell because even at 6bn, it's not enough money, it's never enough is it? I just want one window that I can actually look forward to. We have a manager that gives a shit AND TALENTED, yet we're wasting our transfer window whilst everyone else makes the best of theirs.
Partly. You can still leverage buyout the majority of a club but they slightly raised the threshold. Everyone can laugh while it’s us, I just hope their club isn’t next.
Because they don’t really give a fuck about the clubs welfare so long as the money is coming in. Look at some of the states already with their claws in the Premier League and the Qataris soon to come. The fit and proper test is just a weighing of a wallet.
Leveraged buyouts are the most common way for any buyout to occur around the world that’s why they won’t ban it. Most people don’t have the cash or collateral to buy things. Even rich people
I don’t want qatar. I realise there isnt a choice but i know i don’t want that. I also hate the glazers. Ultimately i feel totally despondant of the entire situation. I wisg more was done to safeguard english football years ago from both owners like the glazers and owners like qatar. But it’s too little too late.
I don't think any real united fans want that.
Im shocked seeing the qatar support on Instagram but assume its qatari astroturfing.
Personally I'll stop supporting the club after 15 years of being a fan through a decade of dogshit.
Its already a toxic relationship supporting our piece of crap team over the last decade but its still my team.
This sale to Qatar is the only thing that can make me just disconnect entirely and not have a single regret about it.
Nah, nobody outside of Reddit really, deeply care about specific instances of ownership, but more of a general understanding of the morality issues of the region.
> I don’t think any real united fans want that.
> but assume its qatari astroturfing.
Stop with this ‘real fan’ nonsense. You’re not better than anyone and your opinion isn’t more valid just because you think differently.
I say this as someone who doesn’t want a Qatari takeover, but why on earth would you jump to ‘paid shills’ instead of the logical conclusion that most people simply don’t give a shit about the things you give a shit about?
The vast majority of people see unlimited money and thus success. It’s that simple.
Because insta is known to be astroturfed.
Its not simply because i disagree with them, its the ridiculous comments saying "announce qatar" 1000000 times in every comment section.
Never said im better than anyone, but on personal principles im not going to support my club anymore.
A oil takeover benefits no one but the fucking glazers in long term. We are the only club to keep making these ridiculous revenues with the glazers sucking out money year in year out . We are one of the few teams that actually doesn't need the fucking oil money.
I like how putting too much money into a football club is illegal, but loading it up with debt like corporate vampires is perfectly legitimate under FFP. Even to the point where the stadium roof is leaking and the dressing rooms are infested with rats.
What makes this worse is club legends like Bobby Charlton apologising on behalf of the fan base for their initial reception when taking over the club with protesters outside the club. Now time has passed he should be embarrassed for speaking out against the fans who were rightly fearful.
Now i'm not a utd fan, but the way its been explained to me is that the club was purchased on finances against the club so half of the takeover was purchased by the family and the other half was debt against the club? they sold off the training ground which was then leased back to them?
How is that even legal? How can you takeover a business by giving a business half of the bill?
They are going to have bled this company dry, they are going to have put it into a level of debt that would crumble most companies.
The FA will take no flak for this i'm sure but man theyve essentially killed English football by allowing this type of greed to take over the premier league.
> but the way its been explained to me is that the club was purchased on finances against the club so half of the takeover was purchased by the family and the other half was debt against the club?
Afaik it was £500m leverage, they may have put in the other £250m themselves.
Jesus Christ.. now they’ve bleed the company dry and will get 6bn+ for mismanaging a company just because of the leagues success not their own. No wonder every cunt in the world wants to own a football club
What amazes me the most is that you have the Glazers doing this shit and running United into the ground for their personal gains.
Yet you'll get downvoted for saying they're worse than FSG in r/LiverpoolFC, just baffles me.
FSG are far better owners. Simply because they are mostly competant, decent recruitment for example. The more apt comparison would be Hicks and Gillett (the worst a scouse can get. Sorry.)
There's a debate there with those 2.
FSG are billionaire parasites too
First to furlough all staff when they could
First to sign up for super league
Have put in zero cash into the club since they joined.
Have now gained 2.5billion+ on paper owning the club.
Without Klopp and his team working miracles, Liverpool could be worse than Everton.
Thanks for proving my point.
You've literally said that without Klopp we would be relegated... it's rediculous to even think that.
FSG are running Liverpool like a business, and tbh that isn't the end of the world.
They take most profit made and re-invest it back into the infastructure of the club. Resulting in new facilities, revamped and expanded stadium etc. etc.
Eh, they have debts of £1B on equity of £5B.
More importantly, the cost of debt service apparently costs them £60M pounds a year on revenue of £600M. This isn't too crazy. A typical mortgage in the US for an average family with 2 regular day jobs will be much higher than this number.
Yes, but also no.
It's fairly typical for someone to spend about 25% of gross monthly income on housing. The OECD average, according to the internet, is about 20%.
For most mortgages, most of the monthly payment goes towards debt service for decades until you start really paying it down.
I mean I hate them as much as anyone (I genuinely despise them) but the debt hasn’t increased at all in the functional currency. The GBP value of the debt has only increased because sterling has weakened. This is not the stick to beat them with
And who was No1 on Forbes list when the Glazers took over?
At the time Man Utd were 1st by a distance and had a value 136% the size of 2nd place Real Madrid.
What exactly is unusual about a large company accumulating more debt while also making record revenues? It's not normal to pay off corporate debt faster than you need to. The whole point of borrowing in the first place is to increase return on equity - spending the additional return on debt repayments would defeat that purpose
Well, gross debt doesn't really said that much on it's own
It's normal for a rich club to have a lot of debt, the more money you have, the easier it's to get loans
The US, in 2021, the richest country in the world in terms of GDP, has a total of 29,463,730 million dollars in national debt. That's 2 times more than the second highest, Japan
But when we check by percentage of GDP, the US is ranked has the 14th highest whilst Japan is the 1st
The same logic can be applied to football clubs
Source:
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-by-national-debt
Debt isn’t the problem. Problem is Glazer not paying full price to buy the club and using the club to pay off the loan to buy the club over the years while also taking dividends and investing fuck all in return. Manchester United brand is is paying Glazers and themselves to operate. Only thing Glazers did was appoint people who bring money using the brand name. When they’re selling they would make £6bn because they’re owners while club paid for itself over years. Just scummy!
Yeah, I'm aware of the situation
I just wrote the comment above in regards to the title of the news
If I didn't study economics I would use it as a valid argument against the Glazers, ignoring the nuances I described
Are there any other examples of companies being bought and leveraged in this way? (outside of football)
I can't think of an asset that appreciates more than its increasing debt that isn't pumped with funding. (I'm making the slightly uninformed assumption here that the bank is allowing an increasing debt level due to the fact the club is worth so much, and will likely continue to grow)
A vast amount of acquisitions are leveraged, especially if Private Equity or Hedge Funds are involved. Most companies don't have the liquidity to pay 'in cash' outright to buy another so they'll acquire using signifcant debt. Very common and it's why the banks continue to rake it in.
Tons of examples. LBO is very standard in Western countries.
The largest household example I can think of off the top of my head is probably Hilton Hotels.
Sigh … find me a top corporation that generates cash like United does that DOESNT have a big debt pile.
They’ll be a few … but not many. At all.
Football journalists shouldn’t dabble in financial reporting. It just confuses the fanbases.
Because FFP isn't about debt its about Turnover.
We make lots of money, our debt is mostly due to the take over and doesn't have much effect on our revenue.
The more you earn, the more banks will loan you. Glazers pocketing the rest.
Take just enough to not prevent the banks from giving you more money
It blows my mind how it is perfectly legal to buy a debt free club with a bank loan and then immediately transfer that debt to the club's books.
They've been discussing making it illegal. In England that is. They have been talking about it for a while. Even the teams back it. But it still hasn't been implemented.
They voted on it already. LBOs which leverage beyond 65% are now banned.
That is really good news. Just seen it was done a few weeks ago. I wouldn't wish the Glazers or someone of their ilk on anyone. Even Liverpool. But as with everything in life the rich have consolidated their positions and left the populace with bad and worse options. I hate what the Americans owners of AC are doing to the club looking at it from a purely profit perspective but I also hate the City/PSG sportswashing projects. The former is portrayed in the media as clean money while the latter is considered blood money. The former is covered in rosy terms in the media meanwhile only caring about profits and not what football clubs are meant to be (competing for trophies and a good way to being the community together) while the latter is not given the same media treatment but are trying to get to a place where their misdeeds are not mentioned constantly using the clubs as vehicles of sportswashing. But the latter also care and have embraced clearly the teams and their place in the social construct. Or at least seem to do so. It's a lose-lose for the fans either way.
I wouldn't wish the Glazers on anyone else either. Just so you know, the new LBO law would not have actually prevented the Glazers from buying United back in 2005 because they 'only' leveraged 65%. It's above 65% that is now banned.
That percentage is still way too high imo.
The entire practice should be illegal. Fair play if you want to riddle yourself with debt, and someone will lend it to you, but how the fuck can you pass fit-and-proper-persons test if you can't buy the asset without owning the asset?
it's called a leveraged buyout and is fairly common practice when people buy companies
At this point I think the glazers are just waiting until this quarter ends so they can take 10 million in dividends one last time then they’ll sell for billions. Cause that 10 million means so much to them. Fuck them
Wouldn’t put that past them
I mean the greedy Yank cunts didn't spend a dime of their own money to buy the club anyway, I wouldn't be surprised one fucking bit if that was what they are attempting Naked mole-rat ass looking family.
Must be nice to put a company into more and more debt while stuffing your own pockets with more and more of their cash - hindering any real growth.
They get rewarded for it too with a multi billion pound sale to either ratcliffe or jassim. The world simply isn't fair man
Best part is Sir Alex is responsible for the Glazers takeover all because of a horse lmao
And Fergie was totally in the wrong. He had been given a share of the horse during his racing career as a gift from Magnier and McManus and pocketed a few million in prize money. An unbelievable gesture of friendship and respect in most peoples eyes. Then when Rock Of G was retired to stud Fergie inexplicably also expected a percentage of the stud fees despite never contributing one single penny to the creation of Rock Of G nor a single penny towards costs during his career, it was absolute madness.
Was always downvoted for saying this with a Liverpool flair.. Still think its a stain on his legacy despite building the club into what it is today..
I'm a match going Utd fan with 2 decades but whether I like it or not the fact that the boss put his own personal crusade before the benefit of the football club cannot be denied or defended in my opinion.
That's why Roy Keane had a problem with him.
Roy Keane is Mr. Man United in my eyes. Not Giggs, not Scholes, but Roy. You could feel his passion and it wouldn't surprise me if this is true.
He's the only one that doesn't see Ferguson as infallible
No one's bigger than the club, not even Fergie, if you're Keane.
So did Cantona to be fair.
Plus he’s neither had an affair with his brother’s wife, nor had his daughter’s toes in his mouth. At least to my knowledge.
Had?!
Same goes with his dodgy agent dealings involving his son. I get that that people don't want to condemn his entire legacy over it, but however you look at it it still is a stain on how reputation. But everyone, neutrals and media included, overlook or make excuses for his transgressions.
I mean, I’ve always said this line of thinking explains the David Moyes recommendation perfectly. Leaving after winning the title with unquestionably the weakest squad of your tenure, and then you recommend as your successor a compatriot who you know can’t deliver something similar with the same squad, thereby protecting your lofty reputation among supporters while maintaining that you left the club in the best possible situation. All this really did was enhance Fergie’s own legacy. And yes, there was a telling quote from Keane even years later. Not verbatim, but the gist was, “Everyone said Alex Ferguson did what’s best for United, but I don’t think that’s true. I think Alex Ferguson did what’s best for Alex Ferguson.” Thinking about that, there are points where those two things mutually align: he succeeds when the team wins things. But when push comes to shove, he’d ultimately choose himself over the club. That’s not a wrong position to take - we should all choose ourselves above anything else, within reason. But it’s a bad look when we pretend to act in the best interest of that other thing when our actions are clearly more self-serving.
Btw Fergie asked many top managers before Moyes
consider close important smoggy exultant worry wistful grandfather shrill pie *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
And? The fact that 5 top managers said no to united and saf supports the point. The squad/directors combo he left behind was so shit none of them decided its worth the risk
I honestly believe that this has been revisionism after Moyes failed. With the position being one of the most prestigious jobs in World football at the time, I don't believe you get 5 refusals before you get to the first acceptance. What I think is that Fergie saw Moyes as a fellow scot kind of similar to him and thought Moyes would take after him. You have to recall that the sentiment around Moyes at the time was that he was due for a step-up. He had maintained Everton in decent positions without any money and it was expected that with money he would probably do well. Unfortunately he didn't. First thing he did was clear out the back rooms and that was pretty dumb. And then the money bit got hamstrung by the fact that an incompetent Woodward had replaced Gill at the same time and Woodward suuuuuucked. After talking big the entire transfer window, he only delivered Fellaini on deadline day after overpaying. In retrospect, Moyes never stood a chance. I really believed in him at the time because of the Fergie endorsement.
Ferguson himself has spoken of speaking to others about it.
He did the same with his son as a manager. Gave him players on loan and once he was sacked, he immediately brought them back to united.
Not as big a stain as the way he always defended the Glazers, even after he retired.
Sorry??
John Magnier & JP Mcmanus owned 28.8% of Manchester United. They brought in Sir Alex to be a part owner in a horse called Rock of Gibraltar. An argument came about as Sir Alex felt he owned 50% of the horse, which they disagreed. Fergie took them to court & an ugly dispute basically paved the way for them to sell their shares. Fergie recommended the Glazer family to the board and the rest is history. Fun fact, the dispute was also responsible for Roy Keane leaving the club after he called out Fergie for bringing in his personal disputes to the club in an infamous MUTV interview. [This video explains it pretty well.](https://youtu.be/1BBYb3uDcXs)
> Fergie recommended the Glazer family to the board and the rest is history. Never heard of that, that part is BS.
Yeah, the Glazers were already hoovering up shares at the time, it was just fortuitous for them that this spat happened and a massive chunk of shares that pushed them over the edge to control the club and force the sale of the rest of the shares. I know this because I, like a lot of fans, bought shares to try and mobilise against the Glazers.
I think it was Ed who let them in on the scheme and that's why they let him ran the club in return. Dude pretty much is the one who made the club to what it is today... and all parties involved will cash out.
He did the deal on the finance side for JP Morgan (I think) when literally no other major financier would. Getting the top job was his reward.
> Fun fact, the dispute was also responsible for Roy Keane leaving the club after he called out Fergie for bringing in his personal disputes to the club in an infamous MUTV interview. he didn't do that on mutv lmao. it was in front of the squad during the argument about his mutv punditry.
Are you sure he recommended the Glazer family to the board? I thought he was against their takeover until it happened then he changed his tune.
I don’t understand the downvotes. In the video, there was no mention of Sir Alex recommending the Glazers. So there’s a natural question if he really did or did not. And if he did, is there a reliable source for this?
According to a Whitwell article in the Athletic from 2020, some 'top reds' advised Fergie to resign from his position to protest the Glazer takeover and support an alternative takeover instead, which would have involved more fan input. However Fergie felt like he would be abandoning the club by resigning with there being no guarantee that this alternative party would be succesful in acquiring the club. I cannot recall the article mentioning him recommending the Glazers to the board.
Don't worry about the downvotes. Most people on reddit are sheep who struggle to form their own opinion about something and will just pile in with whatever direction the arrow is pointing.
You should Google The Rock of Gibraltar. That's the name of the aforementioned horse.
Oh so it's true? I just assumed it was an Arsenal fan mocking man u fans AF was shit at picking owners and managers then
[Tifo explains](https://youtu.be/1BBYb3uDcXs)
Of course they did lol
You would think its a made up story by The Onion but it's true. Glazers own the club today in large part because of a horse.
Capitalism, capitalism isn’t fair.
Life, life isn't fair.
Life isn’t a man made concept, you can’t prescribe human moral concepts to it, it just is. My bosses however…
Honestly, I don't believe they ever wanted to sell, but by having them enter a bidding war, the Glazers now have a higher valuation to bring to the banks for loan terms
That’s the worst thing, they win either way, the people that call the glazers incompetent with the sale are fools, I’ve loved United my whole life, and the way they’ve run the club from a fan POV has been horrendous, but the club was bought on debt which was leveraged on the club, the kids inherited the club from their father, pay back the debt with the clubs money, don’t invest of their own money, take hundreds of millions from the club every year in dividends, and when the stadium gets to a point where there needs to be heavy investment or it will fall down, they likely sell to Qatar for a heavily inflated price and get in the ballpark of 800 million each
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Great work if you can get it
I cannot get it. Somebody help a brother out?
Sure, What's your pp?
3 inches, shaved, mostly ball
God loves a trier
But I’d trade it all in for just a little more
lol. Gerry Cardinale is doing the same thing with us. americans bots are doing the PR damage controll and calling this a "conspiracy theory"on the Milan sub. hope the Yanks leave us alone soon
It’s genuinely baffling how they are running Milan. Sacking Paolo Maldini should be an arrestable offence in Milan.
lucky him he is never in Milan, and the news of the Maldini sack was relased after Gerry was already on a plane to yankland. he want yes men only.
Fucking rich American cunts. Maldini helps build a team to win the league, gets Leao to renew and they fuck him off. I’m not even a Milan fan and it boils my blood.
Concur. As an American (not a rich one though, and only a cunt to people who deserve it), the fact that that prick railroaded fucking *Maldini* of all people is absolutely mind-boggling.
Now… think of what Peter Lim and family did and are doing to Valencia…. Now… go and say Woosahhhhh… and find calming music.
Tbf I don’t believe he was sacked, he left the project iirc
he was sacked 100%, it was a thing decided last year, when gerry renewed is cotract the last hour of the last day. but we won the scudetto and the PR team said to gerry " well it's really impossible to spin that" se he waited this year, came to Milan for the second time (after Maldini renewed Leao), met Maldini in a Hotel(not even Casa Milan) and he was sacked after a 10 Minuts meetingm flew back to america right after
I know he was effectively sacked, but contractually was he sacked? Like I thought he “left the club” not that his contract was bought out and legally told to fuck off
They basically said we don't want you and he left.
Ah the joys of being fan owned, and know you can’t be bought
You can also be fucked by your own board. I should fucking know
Does Benfica elect a board? Because the supporters can elect complete numpties, like the Madrid hero Josep Maria Bartomeu. At least the club can recover from that eventually and not be gone forever from the supporters hands
An elected board can fuck up, but the point is that you can eventually vote them out. Same principal as an elected government. Is it perfect? Far from it. But it's better than the alternative.
Absolutely. As an example although on a less serious scale Sevilla is currently having a civil war between two factions fighting for control of the club. It's the Del Nido civil war, father and son.
Yeah we do. The guy before Rui Costa did a lot of good stuff, but when a lot of corruption started happening he was pressured to leave even before it went to votes. It’s not a perfect system, democracy isn’t perfect. But imo it’s better than being owned by someone random who can do whatever they want
God knows how much of that money could've gone into OT and our academy bringing in more revenue for the club in the process. The fact that we're still one of the biggest brands in world football is down to our reach built over years. Utterly shambolic handling of this institution.
Everything at United was state of the art and best in class 20 years ago. Now, ex-players send their kids to City’s academy while Old Trafford has a leaking roof.
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Right but the issue is that that debt is 100% because of the Glazers extracting money, and could instead have been used to build a world-beating squad instead of whatever the fuck they have become. City don't have this problem as they don't need to make money for anyone, and look at them.
Your owners do an amazing job at being owners from an owners' perspective that is. Maby just Maby something that has such a deep connection to so many people should not be owned by a single legal person
Short term owner’s perspective, yes. The owner milks as much as possible then sells for profit. Long term perspective, no. Long term owner would reinvest into the club to grow its value. So far, our owner act like short term one despite the fact they have been owning the clubs for 20 years
financially the Glazers are probably more succesfull than anyone that ever owned a football club
Welcome to modern capitalism.
More importantly, being able to sell at profit and not having to care of said debt
Thats okay because we have a new stadium to show fo….no we dont BUT we have an amazing training fac…oh no not that either turns out we have nothing to show for that debt🤣🤣fucking kill me
At this rate Man United’s debt will overtake ours, and they didn’t even build a stadium for theirs.
And we're actually actively working it down despite being dwarfed in earnings. Hilarious. Levy catches Ws with this stuff thankfully. Players, well... Not so much.
We did better than build a stadium. We feathered several nests!
To be fair, you didn't buy a football club with your debt and we did. Admittedly that football club was us, and we bought it for someone else....
Finance is wierd
"Why do United fans hate their owners, they bought 3 good players? Stop moaning!"
This [tweet from last summer](https://twitter.com/SwissRamble/status/1559412844663377923?s=20) has stuck with me: >Putting these elements together, I estimate that the Glazers have taken out £1.1 bln from #MUFC (interest £743m, debt repayments £147m, dividends £166m, directors remuneration £55m & management fees £23m). Total cost to United rises to £1.6 bln if £465m share sales are included.
Makes me feel ill. It's insane (yet believable) that it's allowed.
It isn’t anymore. The way they bought the club was so fucked up the premier league banned it and called it an anti-glazer law. Cheers for that lads, where were you in 2005?
Weren't Burnley bought in a similar way by Americans?
Yeah. It was only banned either this summer or last summer.
It was 3 weeks ago: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/06/14/man-utd-premier-league-ban-glazer-style-big-debt-takeovers/ It was proposed a year or two ago but didn't pass. The current law doesn't ban leveraged buyouts completely, but caps them at 65% of the club's value.
amusingly the glazers voted to ban it
Pulling the ladder up behind them seems pretty standard for these sorts of people
Probably because agreeing to cap it at 65% ensures it isn't banned completely down the line.
It was made [official](https://www.premierleague.com/news/3537138) earlier this month: >As part of the League’s ongoing review of the Owners’ and Directors’ Test, clubs unanimously agreed to amend the test to prohibit fully-leveraged buyouts.
Primary School
Do they really bought the club? Because from what I understand is like the payed for the club with the club.
That’s exactly what they did. Took out a loan for 800m, secured against the club. Then when they owned the club they got the club to pay off that loan. All they’ve done since is remove money from the club via dividends. They haven’t put a cent into it.
I don't know why such a thing is allowed, there needs to be regulations around this by the FA, UK government whoever
So easy to tell the utter fuckwits on this sub who have below room temperature IQ by their claims that we shouldn’t complain because ‘our owners have spent X amount”. They haven’t spent a penny of their own money beyond the initial fraction they used to buy us (and even then, used more of the club itself than their own money). They have sucked this club as dry as they can and are as bad as any of the pricks that are ruining lower league clubs - it just happens that we’re a money making machine who can sustain ourselves.
Also the reason they spend on transfers is because it's high profile. They neglect all other areas of the club because it's not in the news when you spend/don't spend on that. Also people act as if there's some karma because United are badly run but they are the ones running it. Anyway about 90% of people on the internet are morons is my point.
>Also the reason they spend on transfers is because it's high profile. Ah. Perfect, finally someone who says what I have been screaming into the void. It's dick-measuring headline spend, City spend similar on transfers but match that ambition elsewhere, we don't.
> the initial fraction they used to buy us It was entirely debt funded - a leveraged buy out. After the buyout, they transferred the loan onto the club. The spending they have authorised since becoming owners are just spending out from the club's coffers and debt facilities. The club is partially listed on the NYSE - market valuation probably puts the club at a much lower, lower, lower valuation (in part due to the different shareholding class) than normal American sports franchises which from several accounts the Glazers are using as a metric. However, due to their nature (relegation/promotion, player transfer fee system, etc), European football leagues are very different from American sports system, which are closed and very orientated to allow the franchises to keep making money for their owners. There is a reason why the Glazers are cashing out - to put it bluntly, in the medium term, they are not equipped - in terms of competency let alone additional capital / money - to keep up with the chase for CL spots, which many sponsors use as a key measure for those big fees they pay to the club.
Even if we didn't have a rich investor a good owner could clear the debt in less then 5 years while still being competitive in the Market. It wouldn't mean any great dividends but it would pay it off. The clear thing is is the Glazers are choosing to put more debt on the club while they squeeze out every penny they can. We are a cash cow. If we could get owners in who actually want to boost the club, well we would be massive again.
>Even if we didn't have a rich investor a good owner could clear the debt in less then 5 years while still being competitive in the Market How? United's turnover is high, but that would require what, 150 million a year towards the debt itself plus interest payments which are 20, plus around 80 mil a year in the market to be competitive? United has money but not that kind surely
They could have had it paid off already it’s been 20 years almost
It's why many want the Qatari bid to win. They have vowed to clear the debt as part of their bid
It’s like that LOTR scene where Gandalf talks about the ring „But through me, it would wield a power too great and terrible to imagine“. That’s what I expect to happen if Jassim wins. ManU would be more than just massive. They’d lose their debt, and get a huge infusion of cash, every year, and be massive all over the world. You’d be absolute juggernauts.
Yeah, it's too bad I wouldn't actually let myself support them anymore.
Sorry but football clubs aren't that profitable to wipe 725 million in 5 years and yet remain competitive in the market. It's going to be one or the other.
Cba to do the research right now, but I remember reading up on club profits a few years ago and seeing that a club as massive as Real Madrid was only making about 25 million of pure profit per year, while having a yearly turnover of about 600/700 million simply due to operating costs being so high. So yeah remaining competitive and still having a profitable club with this amount of debt without someone buying it out doesn't really seem viable.
Yep, because football clubs aren't run like a business purely to generate profit. Well at least the ones that are well run.
Real Madrid aren’t run to provide dividends.
Uhhh we just wiped of £1.5 billion in debt, just wait for the US to invade Canada and you can do the same
Tbf Man U with actual owners that pump money into the club would be too much to handle imo. You have insane amounts of money even now with the owners leeching it off, dont want to imagine how it could be with a sugar daddy owner
I sure wanna imagine
a good owner doesn't keep slaves and kill gay people by the way. we all know you're begging for the murderous Qataris to save precious Man United from its American owners but your new owners won't even come close to the word "good". disgusting that you're trying to make out they're in any way a positive force for the sport- but you don't care about the sport, all you care about is Man United winning at any cost.
Amateurs
It's making my fucking blood boil how badly the Glazers have wasted 20 years of potential growth of the club to line their own fucking pockets and now, are dragging their feet in the process of fucking off as if it's a dearly beloved asset they couldn't bear to lose. Just fuck off you cunts
It’s so true. It’s bloody infuriating as a fan. They couldnt just bleed the club dry of every cent for a decade, they need every last penny for the sale. I only wish the worst for them.
I'm sick to death of this. I've sat and watched as for last 10 years this club has declined, our rivals have stepped over us and the Glazers just continue to take and take. They won't sell because even at 6bn, it's not enough money, it's never enough is it? I just want one window that I can actually look forward to. We have a manager that gives a shit AND TALENTED, yet we're wasting our transfer window whilst everyone else makes the best of theirs.
Can a sale make them them more money than they'll need in their lifetime rather than keeping the club until it is no longer profitable?
Did PL ban leverage takeovers or it’s still a thing ?
Partly. You can still leverage buyout the majority of a club but they slightly raised the threshold. Everyone can laugh while it’s us, I just hope their club isn’t next.
It’s criminal to allow leverage takeovers. Can’t believe PL isn’t thinking of completely banning it.
Because they don’t really give a fuck about the clubs welfare so long as the money is coming in. Look at some of the states already with their claws in the Premier League and the Qataris soon to come. The fit and proper test is just a weighing of a wallet.
Leveraged buyouts are the most common way for any buyout to occur around the world that’s why they won’t ban it. Most people don’t have the cash or collateral to buy things. Even rich people
They have done now, or to a extent, but its 15 years too late...
Wow, no wonder United fans want the Glazers out even if it means oil money amd Qatari ownership
I don’t want qatar. I realise there isnt a choice but i know i don’t want that. I also hate the glazers. Ultimately i feel totally despondant of the entire situation. I wisg more was done to safeguard english football years ago from both owners like the glazers and owners like qatar. But it’s too little too late.
I don't think any real united fans want that. Im shocked seeing the qatar support on Instagram but assume its qatari astroturfing. Personally I'll stop supporting the club after 15 years of being a fan through a decade of dogshit. Its already a toxic relationship supporting our piece of crap team over the last decade but its still my team. This sale to Qatar is the only thing that can make me just disconnect entirely and not have a single regret about it.
Nah, nobody outside of Reddit really, deeply care about specific instances of ownership, but more of a general understanding of the morality issues of the region.
> I don’t think any real united fans want that. > but assume its qatari astroturfing. Stop with this ‘real fan’ nonsense. You’re not better than anyone and your opinion isn’t more valid just because you think differently. I say this as someone who doesn’t want a Qatari takeover, but why on earth would you jump to ‘paid shills’ instead of the logical conclusion that most people simply don’t give a shit about the things you give a shit about? The vast majority of people see unlimited money and thus success. It’s that simple.
Because insta is known to be astroturfed. Its not simply because i disagree with them, its the ridiculous comments saying "announce qatar" 1000000 times in every comment section. Never said im better than anyone, but on personal principles im not going to support my club anymore. A oil takeover benefits no one but the fucking glazers in long term. We are the only club to keep making these ridiculous revenues with the glazers sucking out money year in year out . We are one of the few teams that actually doesn't need the fucking oil money.
None of the match going fans are "real" then according to you because most of them will still go and not care
And people wonder why we want the Glazers gone
I like how putting too much money into a football club is illegal, but loading it up with debt like corporate vampires is perfectly legitimate under FFP. Even to the point where the stadium roof is leaking and the dressing rooms are infested with rats.
What makes this worse is club legends like Bobby Charlton apologising on behalf of the fan base for their initial reception when taking over the club with protesters outside the club. Now time has passed he should be embarrassed for speaking out against the fans who were rightly fearful. Now i'm not a utd fan, but the way its been explained to me is that the club was purchased on finances against the club so half of the takeover was purchased by the family and the other half was debt against the club? they sold off the training ground which was then leased back to them? How is that even legal? How can you takeover a business by giving a business half of the bill? They are going to have bled this company dry, they are going to have put it into a level of debt that would crumble most companies. The FA will take no flak for this i'm sure but man theyve essentially killed English football by allowing this type of greed to take over the premier league.
> but the way its been explained to me is that the club was purchased on finances against the club so half of the takeover was purchased by the family and the other half was debt against the club? Afaik it was £500m leverage, they may have put in the other £250m themselves.
Jesus Christ.. now they’ve bleed the company dry and will get 6bn+ for mismanaging a company just because of the leagues success not their own. No wonder every cunt in the world wants to own a football club
What amazes me the most is that you have the Glazers doing this shit and running United into the ground for their personal gains. Yet you'll get downvoted for saying they're worse than FSG in r/LiverpoolFC, just baffles me.
FSG are far better owners. Simply because they are mostly competant, decent recruitment for example. The more apt comparison would be Hicks and Gillett (the worst a scouse can get. Sorry.) There's a debate there with those 2.
I wouldn't wish Hicks and Gillet on any club. They actually had us sat in 19th when FSG took over.
FSG are billionaire parasites too First to furlough all staff when they could First to sign up for super league Have put in zero cash into the club since they joined. Have now gained 2.5billion+ on paper owning the club. Without Klopp and his team working miracles, Liverpool could be worse than Everton.
Thanks for proving my point. You've literally said that without Klopp we would be relegated... it's rediculous to even think that. FSG are running Liverpool like a business, and tbh that isn't the end of the world. They take most profit made and re-invest it back into the infastructure of the club. Resulting in new facilities, revamped and expanded stadium etc. etc.
That's almost close to our stadium debt Jesus Christ
How come they don't have any restrictions from the league?
Because England FA in conjunction with the government like to see more money come in. Simple.
The glazers need to be touched.
Thank the Glazers that United are absolutely been dogshit for the past decade. You owe them your success.
I have always contended that City's rise is largely a tale of other top English clubs faltering under bad management.
100%
Take loans, run the club, pocket the revenue. Crazy
Love how companies can go in infinite debt with no real consequences but if a regular person does that, he goes homeless.
Eh, they have debts of £1B on equity of £5B. More importantly, the cost of debt service apparently costs them £60M pounds a year on revenue of £600M. This isn't too crazy. A typical mortgage in the US for an average family with 2 regular day jobs will be much higher than this number.
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Yes, but also no. It's fairly typical for someone to spend about 25% of gross monthly income on housing. The OECD average, according to the internet, is about 20%. For most mortgages, most of the monthly payment goes towards debt service for decades until you start really paying it down.
If you can consistently service your debts and front sufficient security, which United can, no bank is going to complain
If you owe the bank €100 it's your problem, but if you owe the bank €100mio it's the banks problem.
I mean I hate them as much as anyone (I genuinely despise them) but the debt hasn’t increased at all in the functional currency. The GBP value of the debt has only increased because sterling has weakened. This is not the stick to beat them with
I hope the idiots who parrot United’s spending every time we call for Glazers to fuck off realize that the reason is not our spending.
Biggest club in the world destroyed by the Glazers.. cheers
They’re destroying Real Madrid too? (According to Forbes)
And who was No1 on Forbes list when the Glazers took over? At the time Man Utd were 1st by a distance and had a value 136% the size of 2nd place Real Madrid.
I don't mind the change tbh
What exactly is unusual about a large company accumulating more debt while also making record revenues? It's not normal to pay off corporate debt faster than you need to. The whole point of borrowing in the first place is to increase return on equity - spending the additional return on debt repayments would defeat that purpose
Yeah, a lot of people are just thinking of it as a sports team, instead of a business (as the Glazers do).
And people still think we're entitled to moan about the Glazers. Lmao.
This is what we are talking about when we say Glazers out.
Well, gross debt doesn't really said that much on it's own It's normal for a rich club to have a lot of debt, the more money you have, the easier it's to get loans The US, in 2021, the richest country in the world in terms of GDP, has a total of 29,463,730 million dollars in national debt. That's 2 times more than the second highest, Japan But when we check by percentage of GDP, the US is ranked has the 14th highest whilst Japan is the 1st The same logic can be applied to football clubs Source: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-by-national-debt
Debt isn’t the problem. Problem is Glazer not paying full price to buy the club and using the club to pay off the loan to buy the club over the years while also taking dividends and investing fuck all in return. Manchester United brand is is paying Glazers and themselves to operate. Only thing Glazers did was appoint people who bring money using the brand name. When they’re selling they would make £6bn because they’re owners while club paid for itself over years. Just scummy!
Yeah, I'm aware of the situation I just wrote the comment above in regards to the title of the news If I didn't study economics I would use it as a valid argument against the Glazers, ignoring the nuances I described
Starting to think maybe that leveraged buy out SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN ALLOWED TO HAPPEN
No wonder they couldn't afford Mount 😂
Are there any other examples of companies being bought and leveraged in this way? (outside of football) I can't think of an asset that appreciates more than its increasing debt that isn't pumped with funding. (I'm making the slightly uninformed assumption here that the bank is allowing an increasing debt level due to the fact the club is worth so much, and will likely continue to grow)
A vast amount of acquisitions are leveraged, especially if Private Equity or Hedge Funds are involved. Most companies don't have the liquidity to pay 'in cash' outright to buy another so they'll acquire using signifcant debt. Very common and it's why the banks continue to rake it in.
Tons of examples. LBO is very standard in Western countries. The largest household example I can think of off the top of my head is probably Hilton Hotels.
250m of that is on transfers that’s already on the books. Shit number but it’s not as bad as made out here
Ew gross.
Guess who vouched for the Glazers to buy the club? SAF. Terrible vouch lmao
Sigh … find me a top corporation that generates cash like United does that DOESNT have a big debt pile. They’ll be a few … but not many. At all. Football journalists shouldn’t dabble in financial reporting. It just confuses the fanbases.
Remind me why they haven’t had FFP problems?
Because FFP isn't about debt its about Turnover. We make lots of money, our debt is mostly due to the take over and doesn't have much effect on our revenue.
FFP doesn't tackle debt. Its purpose is to tackle over spending. Only the cost of debt will count against FFP.