The Swiss : Is Club About To Be Sold ?

[TediousTom]

How many of them were ran by foreign investors? THAT'S the point I'm trying to make Tom. Some businessmen are just not good businessmen!! Their country of origin has nothing to do with it.

Yes I know, I totally understand your point.

If a Scottish buyer comes forward with a bid to purchase our club there is always a chance that the buyer will harbour deep feelings for our club and not just use our beloved Paisley heroes as a plaything.

It is extremely unlikely that any foreigner will care one jot for our club and that my forum friend is a dangerous set of circumstances.

That my chum is realism and not racism.

[JJ McG]

Is it you and Faraway Saint then? The two of you are from Planet Crackpot and clearly aren't real St. Mirren supporters...

[alanb]

I understand and fully respect the above statement, Slash, however the chances of our Club being owned by St. Mirren supporters after the current regime are pretty small I would say. I'm not 100% sure but I'm guessing there aren't many famous or well off business men/women out there who support St. Mirren.

And those who do , their faces don't fit

Edited September 15, 2013 by alanb

[HSS]

Double rollover on the lottery this week.

[shull]

We don't need multi millionaires to invest in our Club, whether they are Scottish or Foreign.

We don't need any investment.

All we need is Custodians to keep our Club solvent with the finances that are available presently.

[Kendo]

We don't need multi millionaires to invest in our Club, whether they are Scottish or Foreign.

We don't need any investment.

All we need is Custodians to keep our Club solvent with the finances that are available presently.

But the Custodians want to sell the club.

[oaksoft]

Yeah, it's really held back Man City and Chelsea.

What is their combined debt and what do you think they'll do when the TV money runs out?

You need to think a bit more long term.

[Leicester Saint]

What is their combined debt and what do you think they'll do when the TV money runs out?

You need to think a bit more long term.

Didnt take you long to come on here trolling me. I'm starting to think you might fancy me or something??

[oaksoft]

If any owner of any club describes their ownership in terms of "investment" then IMHO it means they are looking for a return on that "investment" if a return is made to the owner then that has to come from money generated by the Club which is their investment and which under different ownership model could have instead stayed in the club and benefited the budgets avaliable for the 1st team or youth development.

We will never be seen as an investment, our fan base is too small.

Linwood Buddie, you are missing the point.

It's got nothing to do with the fan base.

It's got everything to do with Scotland being a low wage country but our league is good enough to develop cheap talent from around the world and then sold for a profit.

THAT is the concern.

An additional concern which rea doesn't cover is that the "investment" may in fact simply be loans which the club will have to pay back.

That's what happened at Gretna, Dundee, Hearts, Man City, Man Utd, Liverpool, Chelsea etc etc etc.

That would leave us totally fecked if the experiment doesn't work (which it hasn't for the vast array of clubs who've tried this).

Edited September 15, 2013 by oaksoft

[oaksoft]

Didnt take you long to come on here trolling me. I'm starting to think you might fancy me or something??

Trolling you?: It was a perfectly sensible and rather obvious two questions.

[kevo_smfc]

Did anyone see that hilarious QPR car-crash documentary last season - The Four Year Plan which was on the BBC?

 

Want to see foreign owners in action? 

 

 

Not sure if anyone can get the whole movie somewhere as the BBC iPlayer version has gone http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01d7kd7

 

Sod foreign ownership. 

I seen it and it was not pretty.

[rea]

Linwood Buddie, you are missing the point.

It's got nothing to do with the fan base.

It's got everything to do with Scotland being a low wage country but our league is good enough to develop cheap talent from around the world and then sold for a profit.

THAT is the concern.

An additional concern which rea doesn't cover is that the "investment" may in fact simply be loans which the club will have to pay back.

That's what happened at Gretna, Dundee, Hearts, Man City, Man Utd, Liverpool, Chelsea etc etc etc.

That would leave us totally fecked if the experiment doesn't work (which it hasn't for the vast array of clubs who've tried this).

You are correct (sort of) about the loans bit being a concern. Why I would be less worried about this is because it is only 51% that is for sale. This means that there are significant legal issues an owner would face with what is called "the rights of the minority" which basically means that if the 51% owner acts in a way that alienates the 49% they could have trouble. An example of this would be using the companies own resourses as security to purchase said company

[rea]

In the words of another overspending underachiever "I would love it feckin love it if the SKY TV deal went tits up in England"

The clubs in that league and lower are so much in debt that sometime in the future it will collapse and take a number of clubs down.

The only model that works is the German 50+1 fan ownership which has been in place for decades with strict financial controls to stop overspending cheating clubs like Leeds, Portsmouth (twice!), Leicester and so many others from screwing creditors and the UK taxpayer.

These clubs have all deliberately overspent to the tune of hundred of £M's to achieve success. But at what price to the sport and the country.

I detest all these clubs. They are no different to the cheats in Scotland that include Motherwell, Hearts, Dundee and Rangers.

The German and Swedish 50plus1 model is actually more like a 100% model for most the rule is that clubs can issue 49% equity if they wish to raise capital most have not and remain 100% fanowned

[oaksoft]

You are correct (sort of) about the loans bit being a concern. Why I would be less worried about this is because it is only 51% that is for sale. This means that there are significant legal issues an owner would face with what is called "the rights of the minority" which basically means that if the 51% owner acts in a way that alienates the 49% they could have trouble. An example of this would be using the companies own resourses as security to purchase said company

The risk is that you could probably bet on a significant number of the 49% getting blinded by all the silverware and success and failing to prevent it but you make a decent point there. Fans would be relying on that 49% a little too much for comfort though.

[linwood buddie]

Linwood Buddie, you are missing the point.

It's got nothing to do with the fan base.

It's got everything to do with Scotland being a low wage country but our league is good enough to develop cheap talent from around the world and then sold for a profit.

THAT is the concern.

An additional concern which rea doesn't cover is that the "investment" may in fact simply be loans which the club will have to pay back.

That's what happened at Gretna, Dundee, Hearts, Man City, Man Utd, Liverpool, Chelsea etc etc etc.

That would leave us totally fecked if the experiment doesn't work (which it hasn't for the vast array of clubs who've tried this).

Sorry mate ,don't think I am missing the point , I don't believe any one wants to develop talent from around the world here ,why would they our league is very poor , if we were to be sold to any foreign buyers we would be no more than a toy for them ,so lets get realistic and stop going on about Scotland being a low wage country ,so is half of Europe.

[rea]

The risk is that you could probably bet on a significant number of the 49% getting blinded by all the silverware and success and failing to prevent it but you make a decent point there. Fans would be relying on that 49% a little too much for comfort though.

Key is that it does not require the 49% to act as a whole. My small shareholding or anyone elses is enough to enable an official action (which would be expensive and is a hurdle to a complaint) against only an ownership of 51% and the one thing 10000hours experience did teach many fans is what to look out for regarding ownership.

[HSS]

Key is that it does not require the 49% to act as a whole. My small shareholding or anyone elses is enough to enable an official action (which would be expensive and is a hurdle to a complaint) against only an ownership of 51% and the one thing 10000hours experience did teach many fans is what to look out for regarding ownership.

Before I ask this question may I say I am in no way getting at you.

If you saw 10000 hours as a goer,you must have thought there was a bright future for SMFC?If so,why do you not go for it yourself?

[Drew]

Before I ask this question may I say I am in no way getting at you.

If you saw 10000 hours as a goer,you must have thought there was a bright future for SMFC?If so,why do you not go for it yourself?

Not for me to answer for Richard, but I'm guessing he was motivated by the concept of community ownership, as opposed to buying into the club on a personal basis.

Seems perfectly reasonable to me, however misconceived the initiative might have been.

[rea]

Before I ask this question may I say I am in no way getting at you.

If you saw 10000 hours as a goer,you must have thought there was a bright future for SMFC?If so,why do you not go for it yourself?

At one of the presentations I think I described how after the first bid failed due to funding being withdrawn after it had been approved we did in fact look at doing it ourselves but the legal advice about the "rights of the minority" was exactly why we didnt but for slightly different reasons than the financial ones i posted earlier.

In our case, as you saw we were getting significant abuse (might not be the best word) both publically (all be it anonymously, although we knew who they were) and significant private interference with our funders. With this in mind if we privately owned 51% the same individuals could use the "rights of the minority" rules to cause further issues.

There was also a major conflict of interest potential as I would have been on both sides of the equation both buying the shares and selling the shares to the Fans CIC.

With this in mind and some other minor points the Legal advice at the time was not to proceed and regrettably when that is the advice you get that is what you have to do.

It was the time taken to explore all of this that caused the delay over that Christmas between the first bid and the restart of the second

[rea]

Before I ask this question may I say I am in no way getting at you.

If you saw 10000 hours as a goer,you must have thought there was a bright future for SMFC?If so,why do you not go for it yourself?

But I certainly agree that under the right ownership structure the Club has a great future. IMHO that structure is Cooperative Fanownership

[billyg]

I'm sure it's already been the case.

In the early 80s , at the time of arguably our strongest ever team !

[beyond our ken]

Spoken to Gilzo and he confirmed there is interest from two Swiss businessmen,there is apprehension due to them stating they want to spend big and take us to the top.

I smell Dundee,Livingston and Gretna

What direction is the wind blowing from for that to happen?

Edited September 16, 2013 by beyond our ken

[bud77]

I'm very wary of any wealthy person wanting to buy a football club, we have all seen what happened with Mileson, Murray, Whyte. Romanov and countless others who have tried this ownership model. For me there are various scenarios that can play out

The new owner eventually becomes bored or fed up with the monopoly at the top of the league and sells up to someone else

The new owner tries to run the business in a sustainable way but the fans demand more and more investment in the team to keep the success going (as happened to Murray with Rangers)

The new owner is a liar like Whyte

The new owner goes bankrupt like Romanov

The new owner dies like Mileson

We had our chance to safeguard the club last year and we blew it, I now wouldn't blame the current owners for selling up but think we, as fans, should start getting ready for digging deep into our pockets to keep the club alive at some point in the future.

[fmckinn]

I hope one way or another this is resolved.

IMO all this going on in the background is having a negative influence on the squad. Board dont want to invest any money ( understandable) as they want to sell.We need closure on this sale asap

[Bud the Baker]

If any owner of any club describes their ownership in terms of "investment" then IMHO it means they are looking for a return on that "investment" if a return is made to the owner then that has to come from money generated by the Club which is their investment and which under different ownership model could have instead stayed in the club and benefited the budgets avaliable for the 1st team or youth development.

A bit rich coming from the leader of a bid that was relying for part of it's funding on the club's own assets - Corporate Membership schemes that were really glorified Hospitality Packages and developing The Void area.

Edited September 16, 2013 by Bud the Baker