Mark Attanasio

[GMF 757]

25 minutes ago, norfolkngood said:

you seem to understand this better than most so i hope you don't mind answering ,

How Much did MA pay for his 40 % if his loans will be paid back when we get the last of Sky money ?,

is it possible that when we get the last of the sky money MA says i will write off loans and the club keep they last of the sky money meaning he has paid 45 million for his 40 % ??

it looks to me if we pay the loans back to him he has got his 40 % rather cheap 

The loans taken against future parachute payments and the future instalments of the Emi Buendia transfer fees, are with external finance companies and nothing to do with MA.

The debt finance provided by MA is to assist with short term cash flow issues (the payment of players wages) and additional to the external debt.

Edited September 27, 2023 by GMF
Typo

[shefcanary 2,448]

7 minutes ago, norfolkngood said:

you seem to understand this better than most so i hope you don't mind answering ,

How Much did MA pay for his 40 % if his loans will be paid back when we get the last of Sky money ?,

is it possible that when we get the last of the sky money MA says i will write off loans and the club keep they last of the sky money meaning he has paid 45 million for his 40 % ??

it looks to me if we pay the loans back to him he has got his 40 % rather cheap 

@norfolkngood - MA (or technically more correctly his Norfolk Group which although not fully owned by him, is controlled by him and his associates / friends) will have paid £8.3M for his 40% of the club's ordinary shares, as @GMF stated above. And yes, given this values the club at no more than in 2004, given valuations of other similar "yo-yo" clubs being banded around of £100M to £150M, at only £20M this is a VERY CHEAP acquisition. 

I also note MA has previously paid £10M for relatively useless C Preference Shares; a useful cash injection for the club, but only useful as leverage to MA.

MA, via Norfolk Group, has more importantly though, used the leverage of a cheap loan of £28M (net of £5M assuming it is used as payment for the share allotment) to the club to show goodwill and thus reached agreement with his fellow directors for the allotment price at £25 per share, on the basis of a 3 year shareholder agreement with Smith & Jones - effectively all parties stating we are all in this together and attempt to look as if none has tried harder than the others. 

But that ignores the impact of that loan. MA could argue he has invested, again as GMF said, c. £50M into the club in one form or another. Looking at this as a cost of investment (and no doubt MA would) a more appropriate valuation of the club is c.£125M (so NOT SO CHEAP, on a par with the Burnley and Sheff United). You will argue though that the £28M is repayable, thus reducing his investment, and I could also not argue with that view either. However the loan is part of the equation and cannot be ignored.

What neither I, GMF, or any of the other honorary members of the FPA can say for certain, is whether there is any Sky money still to come that can pay MA back that £28M, thus effectively reducing his total cost of investment - there is simply no up to date financial information included in the GM paperwork. We can refer to a note in the previous financial statements that said loans taken out in 2022 could be fully repaid using this Sky money, but no-one has any clue except club officials what has happened since. My fear is that the club has continued to make losses (or more accurately overpaid player salaries) such that the loan from MA will become a permanent feature. There has to be a reason why Smith & Jones agreed to this share restructure - it smacks a little of nowhere else to go for funding! Some comments emanating from the club imply MA was not prepared to lend money unless his shareholding increased!

More positively, maybe MA has told Smith & Jones he will not seek to recover the loan immediately, to allow the club to invest in other things (but this is just my hypothesis - I have no real evidence).

@mastoola also raised the question of what happens if Smith & Jones sell up to MA in due course at the end of the Shareholder agreement period and whether they would sell at a profit? Only they can share their intentions at this stage, but they have publicly stated that they did not want to be seen to profit from their involvement with the club. However, if they don't make profit, then MA certainly will have the opportunity to do so! And earlier in this thread I have demonstrated that based on various metrics and from the evidence within the GM papers, shares can be valued at anywhere between £25 and £200! At that top level, Attanasio makes a 800% return! Are Smith & Jones really going to turn down such an opportunity? My hypothesis is that they won't, but will channel profits into a charitable foundation of some kind for the long term good of young people / sport in East Anglia.

It is to be hopped that more will be stated after the GM on 2 October. However I will not hold my breath and feel this thread will have more life yet!

[shefcanary 2,448]

31 minutes ago, GMF said:

The debt finance provided by MA is to assist with short term cash flow issues (the payment of players wages) and additional to the external debt.

Have you heard this definitively @GMF? There is nothing within the paperwork to say what this finance was provided for. I assumed it merely replaced the external loans, the paperwork makes reference to negotiations with alternative external provider (the Ecotonian Finance) but MA in the end provided a letter of credit at a lower price, until his final facility was put in place. Your statement seems to contradict this, which wouldn't surprise me, but is disappointing to learn the club is still piling on more debt. 

[BigFish 1,988]

23 minutes ago, norfolkngood said:

it looks to me if we pay the loans back to him he has got his 40 % rather cheap 

The nub of the matter is how do you value trophy assets, which is what football clubs tend to be. NCFC Ltd is a public company that for its entire history has effectively made no profit and paid no dividends. In purely commercial terms it is only worth the value of the liquidated assets, less the liabilities e.g. probably not much, tens of millions rather than hundreds. It is a zombie company.

Furthermore, all this talk of 40% is rather specious. MA has purchased 22% of the club from existing shareholders in private transactions. What he paid for these is nobody's business except the parties involved. I presume the sellers were happy with the amount received. These sort of transactions were open to anyone at any time and more could have been offered, but no one did. 

This would indicate that MA is the only game in town. So when it comes to the 18% that this transaction actually involves it is difficult to argue for a price at a different value. I am sure that some will argue that there should be some sort of comparative valuation that takes into account the prices paid for other clubs. But without an alternative bidder/option that is purely hypothetical.

Where shareholders, but not non-shareholding fans, may have grounds to complain is if this dilution negatively impacts the value of their holding. Theoretically it does, but this will only be crystallized when we reach the end game and they sell their shares. Some posters such as @Parma Ham's gone mouldy have intimated that this will be mitigated by the good will of the major protagonists, by this can only be taken on trust.

[Davidlingfield 63]

19 hours ago, GMF said:

The answer here is very simple, this debt will be refinanced

Except that it won’t as there are no assets left to provide security.

[GMF 757]

12 minutes ago, Davidlingfield said:

Except that it won’t as there are no assets left to provide security.

MA will own 40% of the club, and have significant skin in the game, in this instance best part of £50m, and it’s almost certainly his existing loans that are being refinanced. It’s his judgement call, ultimately, but, I’d suggest that he’s unlikely to walk away. There’s far more upside to come, hopefully. 

[GMF 757]

24 minutes ago, shefcanary said:

Have you heard this definitively @GMF? There is nothing within the paperwork to say what this finance was provided for. I assumed it merely replaced the external loans, the paperwork makes reference to negotiations with alternative external provider (the Ecotonian Finance) but MA in the end provided a letter of credit at a lower price, until his final facility was put in place. Your statement seems to contradict this, which wouldn't surprise me, but is disappointing to learn the club is still piling on more debt. 

Indeed, there is nothing in the paperwork.

The loans against the parachute payments are not with Ecotonian, I can say that with certainty, having asked the question previously. I also suspect that the loans against the future transfer receipts would have been from a similar source, but I can’t say that for sure.

All I have been told, and I don’t have any reason to doubt it, is that the MA debt financing is on favourable terms in comparison to alternatives available in the market at the time.

[norfolkngood 1,087]

36 minutes ago, shefcanary said:

@norfolkngood - MA (or technically more correctly his Norfolk Group which although not fully owned by him, is controlled by him and his associates / friends) will have paid £8.3M for his 40% of the club's ordinary shares, as @GMF stated above. And yes, given this values the club at no more than in 2004, given valuations of other similar "yo-yo" clubs being banded around of £100M to £150M, at only £20M this is a VERY CHEAP acquisition. 

I also note MA has previously paid £10M for relatively useless C Preference Shares; a useful cash injection for the club, but only useful as leverage to MA.

MA, via Norfolk Group, has more importantly though, used the leverage of a cheap loan of £28M (net of £5M assuming it is used as payment for the share allotment) to the club to show goodwill and thus reached agreement with his fellow directors for the allotment price at £25 per share, on the basis of a 3 year shareholder agreement with Smith & Jones - effectively all parties stating we are all in this together and attempt to look as if none has tried harder than the others. 

But that ignores the impact of that loan. MA could argue he has invested, again as GMF said, c. £50M into the club in one form or another. Looking at this as a cost of investment (and no doubt MA would) a more appropriate valuation of the club is c.£125M (so NOT SO CHEAP, on a par with the Burnley and Sheff United). You will argue though that the £28M is repayable, thus reducing his investment, and I could also not argue with that view either. However the loan is part of the equation and cannot be ignored.

What neither I, GMF, or any of the other honorary members of the FPA can say for certain, is whether there is any Sky money still to come that can pay MA back that £28M, thus effectively reducing his total cost of investment - there is simply no up to date financial information included in the GM paperwork. We can refer to a note in the previous financial statements that said loans taken out in 2022 could be fully repaid using this Sky money, but no-one has any clue except club officials what has happened since. My fear is that the club has continued to make losses (or more accurately overpaid player salaries) such that the loan from MA will become a permanent feature. There has to be a reason why Smith & Jones agreed to this share restructure - it smacks a little of nowhere else to go for funding! Some comments emanating from the club imply MA was not prepared to lend money unless his shareholding increased!

More positively, maybe MA has told Smith & Jones he will not seek to recover the loan immediately, to allow the club to invest in other things (but this is just my hypothesis - I have no real evidence).

@mastoola also raised the question of what happens if Smith & Jones sell up to MA in due course at the end of the Shareholder agreement period and whether they would sell at a profit? Only they can share their intentions at this stage, but they have publicly stated that they did not want to be seen to profit from their involvement with the club. However, if they don't make profit, then MA certainly will have the opportunity to do so! And earlier in this thread I have demonstrated that based on various metrics and from the evidence within the GM papers, shares can be valued at anywhere between £25 and £200! At that top level, Attanasio makes a 800% return! Are Smith & Jones really going to turn down such an opportunity? My hypothesis is that they won't, but will channel profits into a charitable foundation of some kind for the long term good of young people / sport in East Anglia.

It is to be hopped that more will be stated after the GM on 2 October. However I will not hold my breath and feel this thread will have more life yet!

Thankyou For a Excellent post 

I Agree that Delia and MWJ have always said they do not want to make profit and i believe them , 

i also Agree why should they just hand the club over to MA for no profit if he can just sell it and make himself richer ! ,

i am sure whatever delia and MWJ receive will be put to good use by either the club or by a local charity or whatever they choose ,

[GMF 757]

33 minutes ago, BigFish said:

Furthermore, all this talk of 40% is rather specious. MA has purchased 22% of the club from existing shareholders in private transactions. What he paid for these is nobody's business except the parties involved.

This bit actually isn’t so, as the number of shares held is known and the total consideration disclosed. A quick calculation tells us it’s £25.00 a share, exactly the same as the proposed allotment price.

[Davidlingfield 63]

7 minutes ago, norfolkngood said:

Thankyou For a Excellent post 

I Agree that Delia and MWJ have always said they do not want to make profit and i believe them , 

i also Agree why should they just hand the club over to MA for no profit if he can just sell it and make himself richer ! ,

i am sure whatever delia and MWJ receive will be put to good use by either the club or by a local charity or whatever they choose ,

My guess is that Delia and Michael don’t really understand the implications, either for themselves or the Club, as they are totally reliant on what advisors and Attansio are telling them.

A dangerous position to be in, particularly as there no one within the Club who can help them out.

[GMF 757]

13 minutes ago, Davidlingfield said:

My guess is that Delia and Michael don’t really understand the implications, either for themselves or the Club, as they are totally reliant on what advisors and Attansio are telling them.

A dangerous position to be in, particularly as there no one within the Club who can help them out.

If only they had an independent Chairman who they could rely upon, but, sadly, they seem to believe that one isn’t required…

[BigFish 1,988]

23 minutes ago, GMF said:

This bit actually isn’t so, as the number of shares held is known and the total consideration disclosed. A quick calculation tells us it’s £25.00 a share, exactly the same as the proposed allotment price.

Thanks @GMF, my bad.

Am I right in the understanding that this could have been confidential if it wasn't for the share issue/waiver process?

[GMF 757]

1 minute ago, BigFish said:

Thanks @GMF, my bad.

Am I right in the understanding that this could have been confidential if it wasn't for the share issue/waiver process?

Initially, yes, but the moment there was a proposal, such as this one, which would take his shareholding to 30%, or above, full disclosure was required, especially since everything was within 12 months.

[Davidlingfield 63]

14 minutes ago, GMF said:

If only they had an independent Chairman who they could rely upon, but, sadly, they seem to believe that one isn’t required…

Agreed, sad both for them personally, but also potentially for the future of our Club.

[GMF 757]

6 minutes ago, Davidlingfield said:

Agreed, sad both for them personally, but also potentially for the future of our Club.

Will be interesting to see, assuming this gets passed and MA can appoint another director, whether the status quo is maintained, either for another 3 years, or thereafter…

[shefcanary 2,448]

Just now, GMF said:

Will be interesting to see, assuming this gets passed and MA can appoint another director, whether the status quo is maintained, either for another 3 years, or thereafter…

Strangely, it being a football club, much may depend on what happens on the pitch in this regard. 🙂 

[GMF 757]

4 minutes ago, shefcanary said:

Strangely, it being a football club, much may depend on what happens on the pitch in this regard. 🙂 

It really shouldn’t, though, should it? 

[shefcanary 2,448]

1 minute ago, GMF said:

It really shouldn’t, though, should it? 

Ah, depends on the fans in the stands then? 🙂 

[Badger 2,412]

1 hour ago, Davidlingfield said:

Except that it won’t as there are no assets left to provide security.

?

[komakino 274]

22 minutes ago, shefcanary said:

Strangely, it being a football club, much may depend on what happens on the pitch in this regard. 🙂 

It is likely Norwich City will remain in the The Championship, which would mean that the club would have to be very careful on wages as no EPL cash would be forthcoming, when traditionally we pay high wages for Tier 2 for a variety of reasons. A trip to League 1 would be unthinkable, whereas a return to the top tier would be interesting in whether our American friends would want to the club to make more of an effort to stay there - or not - compared to D&M. 

[nutty nigel 7,619]

1 hour ago, Davidlingfield said:

My guess is that Delia and Michael don’t really understand the implications, either for themselves or the Club, as they are totally reliant on what advisors and Attansio are telling them.

A dangerous position to be in, particularly as there no one within the Club who can help them out.

I somehow doubt that Delia and Michael are dumber than the contributors to this thread. They are millionaires through their own businesses.

We get posters suggesting that they are well meaning amateurs running our football club but this is both daft and baseless. It's akin to suggesting they fill balloons with lead and expecting them to fly. Yet Delia and Michael's balloons always seem to float up to their ceiling.

We want a higher ceiling but self serving amateur's ceilings are not often as high as D&M's.

Edited September 27, 2023 by nutty nigel

[GMF 757]

Come on @nutty nigel, you’re better than that to suggest anyone posting on this tread are dumber than D&M, just because they happen to have been successful in life via other means.

What is abundantly obvious is that they have left the running of the club to others for a number of years. To be honest, I wouldn’t expect anything less, however, that means that they are hugely reliant upon the selected people.

Occasionally, in my opinion, they would have benefited from advice from others, who aren’t as close to the action as their appointed executive officers. That doesn’t make them bad owners, per se, but would reduce their reliance on the said executive officers, “marketing their own homework.”

[nutty nigel 7,619]

1 minute ago, GMF said:

Come on @nutty nigel, you’re better than that to suggest anyone posting on this tread are dumber than D&M, just because they happen to have been successful in life via other means.

What is abundantly obvious is that they have left the running of the club to others for a number of years. To be honest, I wouldn’t expect anything less, however, that means that they are hugely reliant upon the selected people.

Occasionally, in my opinion, they would have benefited from advice from others, who aren’t as close to the action as their appointed executive officers. That doesn’t make them bad owners, per se, but would reduce their reliance on the said executive officers, “marketing their own homework.”

Indeed GMF, but you're better than suggesting they're smarter than D&M.

I can only view this through football achievements and in the last 10 years we've won two championships and a play-off final at Wembley. How does that compare? As I said, we hit a ceiling but that ceiling isn't as low as so many self-serving amateurs.

[shefcanary 2,448]

30 minutes ago, nutty nigel said:

Indeed GMF, but you're better than suggesting they're smarter than D&M.

I can only view this through football achievements and in the last 10 years we've won two championships and a play-off final at Wembley. How does that compare? As I said, we hit a ceiling but that ceiling isn't as low as so many self-serving amateurs.

It's true, most of here haven't experienced running a football club on here (well maybe not a professional football club, I have assisted in the running of a couple of junior ones for example). The reason so many are deeply involved in this thread however is that in business, quite a few of us have been successful and have built up years of real life experience and perhaps if given the opportunity would have advised Delia and Michael to have approached things, in a business sense, differently over the years. They wouldn't have had to listen, which I would accept gracefully. They do seem to have gotten themselves into a real pickle this time though. Many on here would love to hear their views on how they plan to get out of it, but until the vote is over unfortunately we are unable to.

[GMF 757]

@shefcanary the Club doesn’t air it’s dirty linen in public, quite rightly so, but there are times when a little more transparency wouldn’t go amiss.

Assuming that this goes through, personally I’d like to hear a bit more from MA. It would have to be considered, given the three years voting period, but some further insight would be helpful all around.

[shefcanary 2,448]

6 minutes ago, GMF said:

@shefcanary the Club doesn’t air it’s dirty linen in public, quite rightly so, but there are times when a little more transparency wouldn’t go amiss.

Assuming that this goes through, personally I’d like to hear a bit more from MA. It would have to be considered, given the three years voting period, but some further insight would be helpful all around.

Absolutely, and when we have something to read about their / his future plans, it will provide hours more amusement on here! Can't wait ... 🙂 

[Parma Ham's gone mouldy 2,243]

4 hours ago, shefcanary said:

@norfolkngood - MA (or technically more correctly his Norfolk Group which although not fully owned by him, is controlled by him and his associates / friends) will have paid £8.3M for his 40% of the club's ordinary shares, as @GMF stated above. And yes, given this values the club at no more than in 2004, given valuations of other similar "yo-yo" clubs being banded around of £100M to £150M, at only £20M this is a VERY CHEAP acquisition. 

I also note MA has previously paid £10M for relatively useless C Preference Shares; a useful cash injection for the club, but only useful as leverage to MA.

MA, via Norfolk Group, has more importantly though, used the leverage of a cheap loan of £28M (net of £5M assuming it is used as payment for the share allotment) to the club to show goodwill and thus reached agreement with his fellow directors for the allotment price at £25 per share, on the basis of a 3 year shareholder agreement with Smith & Jones - effectively all parties stating we are all in this together and attempt to look as if none has tried harder than the others. 

But that ignores the impact of that loan. MA could argue he has invested, again as GMF said, c. £50M into the club in one form or another. Looking at this as a cost of investment (and no doubt MA would) a more appropriate valuation of the club is c.£125M (so NOT SO CHEAP, on a par with the Burnley and Sheff United). You will argue though that the £28M is repayable, thus reducing his investment, and I could also not argue with that view either. However the loan is part of the equation and cannot be ignored.

What neither I, GMF, or any of the other honorary members of the FPA can say for certain, is whether there is any Sky money still to come that can pay MA back that £28M, thus effectively reducing his total cost of investment - there is simply no up to date financial information included in the GM paperwork. We can refer to a note in the previous financial statements that said loans taken out in 2022 could be fully repaid using this Sky money, but no-one has any clue except club officials what has happened since. My fear is that the club has continued to make losses (or more accurately overpaid player salaries) such that the loan from MA will become a permanent feature. There has to be a reason why Smith & Jones agreed to this share restructure - it smacks a little of nowhere else to go for funding! Some comments emanating from the club imply MA was not prepared to lend money unless his shareholding increased!

More positively, maybe MA has told Smith & Jones he will not seek to recover the loan immediately, to allow the club to invest in other things (but this is just my hypothesis - I have no real evidence).

@mastoola also raised the question of what happens if Smith & Jones sell up to MA in due course at the end of the Shareholder agreement period and whether they would sell at a profit? Only they can share their intentions at this stage, but they have publicly stated that they did not want to be seen to profit from their involvement with the club. However, if they don't make profit, then MA certainly will have the opportunity to do so! And earlier in this thread I have demonstrated that based on various metrics and from the evidence within the GM papers, shares can be valued at anywhere between £25 and £200! At that top level, Attanasio makes a 800% return! Are Smith & Jones really going to turn down such an opportunity? My hypothesis is that they won't, but will channel profits into a charitable foundation of some kind for the long term good of young people / sport in East Anglia.

It is to be hopped that more will be stated after the GM on 2 October. However I will not hold my breath and feel this thread will have more life yet!

Ahhh…the hypothetical equity gain….

Parma

[GMF 757]

1 minute ago, Parma Ham's gone mouldy said:

Ahhh…the hypothetical equity gain….

Parma

Perhaps you should start a thread on this? (Winks) 

[nutty nigel 7,619]

1 hour ago, shefcanary said:

It's true, most of here haven't experienced running a football club on here (well maybe not a professional football club, I have assisted in the running of a couple of junior ones for example). The reason so many are deeply involved in this thread however is that in business, quite a few of us have been successful and have built up years of real life experience and perhaps if given the opportunity would have advised Delia and Michael to have approached things, in a business sense, differently over the years. They wouldn't have had to listen, which I would accept gracefully. They do seem to have gotten themselves into a real pickle this time though. Many on here would love to hear their views on how they plan to get out of it, but until the vote is over unfortunately we are unable to.

All of us on here are experienced in life. We view things through the lens of what that experience has taught us.

My life experiences are unique to me like yours are to you. My views, expectations and forecasts, if you were to look back, haven't been any the worse for that.

I commented because a poster seemed to claim that the FPAs on here knew better than Michael and Delia. That would be a preposterous claim. 

Back to a more general point. At the forum in the Forum Zoe explained why there were difficulties getting this done. My view on what she was saying is that our football club doesn't fit with the norm. I can understand this. Delia and Michael have unique qualities as majority owners and custodians of a football club. 

 

Edited September 27, 2023 by nutty nigel

[shefcanary 2,448]

46 minutes ago, nutty nigel said:

Back to a more general point. At the forum in the Forum Zoe explained why there were difficulties getting this done. My view on what she was saying is that our football club doesn't fit with the norm. I can understand this. Delia and Michael have unique qualities as majority owners and custodians of a football club. 

She did indeed, and that is where me and others on here were shocked, not that she had experienced those difficulties, but that she had not anticipated them given our club's unique circumstances (which I have recognised for a very long time). This is where I certainly (through that old governance element again) would have expected the Board and the Executive to have had this in the forefront of their mind from the start. I appreciate they may not have come across such circumstances in their business lives before, but that is when you need the ear of an independent person on the Board who may well have done!