Cullum (again I am afraid)

[Tangible Fixed Assets anyone? 0]

[quote user="jbghost"]

Even in todays financial climate there would be plenty of people willing to buy the Carrow Road site for future developement. If you are a property developer with a bit of money it''s the perfect time to buy. There is no reason at all why you wouldn''t get planning consent. With consent already granted all around the ground the precedent is set for future developement.

[/quote]

What do you think the acreage is, currently occupied by the stands and pitch?

[Tangible Fixed Assets anyone? 0]

[quote user="Desert Fox"]

[quote user="Lazza"]I could be very wrong but as I see it like this:

The club has been valued at £16M (rightly or wrongly - doesn''t matter).
This value is currently "owned" by the current share-holders of which Delia & MWJ own 60% so that''s £9.6M (is that right?).
The remaining £6.4M is owned by other shareholders.

If £20M of new shared were sold NCFC wouldn''t suddenly be worth £36M - it would still be worth £16M with £20M in the bank but there would be roughly twice as many shares of the same £16M worth effectively halving the value of the shares. This would affect not only Delia and MWJ but also the shareholders who own the other 40% of shares.
The £20M in the bank would improve the potential of ncfc to improve in value by being more successful and possibly get promotion but there are no guarantees and there is little chance that the club would double in value.

Could it be that Delia was simply protecting the interests of all shareholders when she turned down the offer?

Like I said, I could have this all very wrong - this is an area only lawyers & accountants really understand.
[/quote]

Lazza,

I am afraid that you have completely got this wrong. Assuming that the club is currently worth £16M (i.e. its net asset value) and injection of £20M would increase its net assets to £36M. This would matched (i.e. that why it is referred to as a balance sheet) by a combination of increased shareholders equity, accumulated profits or losses and other reserves.

However, to complicate matters further, I would question whether the club has net assets really worth £16M, which is the point that Keelan''s Glove has already made. The ''fire sale'' value of our assets is probably £1M for the playing staff, £5M for the investment land and say another £10M for the ground and Colney at alternative use value. This needs to be set off agianst debts. Therefore, there is likely to be a significant difference between the ''book'' net assets and the ''realisable'' value of those assets.

To complicate matters further, the £20M investment Cullum proposed could either increase or decrease signiifcantly dependning upon how we invested this in players. If we were able to but future Ashton''s this would increase the net vlaue of the club, but future Cureton''s would decrease the net value of the club.

Personally, I think Cullum will bide his time and acquire the whole club for circa £10M once we have taken our current direction of travel to its logical conclusion.

 

Being generous, I would say that

[/quote]

Good post Desert Fox or should I say General R.!

I believe Colney may  have a restriction of use when planning permission was applied for but that may change.

General as a good strategist/tactician you obviously know its sensible for Cullum to wait and pick up the pieces. Why reward the current regime for the current mess? 

 

[Tangible Fixed Assets anyone? 0]

[quote user="Desert Fox"]

Beauseant,

Thanks for responding - I thought you were taking the michael.

I still believe Cullum is interested, as why we would he bother respodning via the EDP - I think he is sufficiently thick skinned not to worry about what Delia say in public. I think he is playing a longer game by waiting for the club to be absolutely on its knees (about another 18 months in my opinion at the current rate of progress) before he comes in and gets the club at a rock bottom price. This would ensure his status as the saviour of the club and ensure that Delia comes away with very little compensation, as the debt holders will rank above shareholders when the final settlement is worked through. The key question is whether Delia can see the writing on the wall know and settle for a bigger pay off than she would otherwise get. Give Seymour Pierce three months max to find a buyer or not and thsi will be probbaly be their last point of having the decision within their control. I think the whole house of cards will fall apart in the Summer when season ticket renewals fall away. Some of this would have happened anyway with the recession, but relagation or a failure to significantly climb the table will make this much worse. Without current levels of season ticket revenue, the club will have to cut the football budget as debt holders are unlikely to budge on repayments.

[/quote]

Well said.

[Tangible Fixed Assets anyone? 0]

[quote user="KeelansGlove"]

Could anyone blame hime for walking away given the lack of respect he was given by the board ?

As I have said elsewhere had they deemed him worthy of a face to face meeting and clarified the reasons his "offer" wasn''t acceptable [/quote]

As I said earlier this summer when the PC news came out and I repeat yet again......its all to do with the valuation of Delia''s & MWJ''s ordinary share holding.

[Tangible Fixed Assets anyone? 0]

[quote user="Bobert"]

The new shares would have required an Extra Ordinary General Meeting with a resolution passed by the shareholders and the new shares offered to the exsisting shareholders. Everyone on this Board seems to forget that there are shareholders other than D & M who have invested in the Club and are entitled to their say and to make further investment if they so wish. NCFC is not a "fans" club, or a members club or D & Ms Club it belongs to the shareholders and they seem to have very little say in what is going on.

I think its time the shareholders association gave there 2 pennyworth.

[/quote]

Are you sure its a Plc?

[Tangible Fixed Assets anyone? 0]

[quote user="The Judge"]

Surely the way to solve the Cullum / Delia debate once and for all is to get Keith Harris to go and speak to Peter Cullum to find out whether he is prepared to invest or not, and on what basis.

Delia and MWJ have appointed him to "seek investment" what ever this means. I am pressuming it means the whole spectrum of investment from small investment for no shares to total share buy out and control. As PC has publicly stated he was prepared to invest £20m for new shares in NCFC - I would suggest he is a pretty good place for Mr Harris to start - and it would provide (should the outcome be made public) absolute clarity on where each party stands.

[/quote]

Good post.

However if KH. managed to broker a deal with PC, how much would KH charge NCFC Plc. for something that should have been carried out by the board of NCFC Plc.?

[whoareyou? 0]

What really makes me angry about this, is that time and again Delia comes out and says she only wants what is best for the club.....but what she really means is she wants what''s best for the club but on her terms.

If Cullum bought £20 million of shares which went straight into the pot for team/football development surely that is best for the club. Her shareholding does NOT become worthless overnight. In fact she would still own 30% of the net worth of the club albeit she would no longer hold ultimate control.

If the club were to become succesful as a result then her 30% would be worth a lot more and be a much more saleable asset.

[vos 155]

 I accept some of the comments made re minority shareholdings etc. In my opinion Delia/MJW shares have a book value of around £6 million. I justify this by stating current book value as at last accounts was around £16 million but included in this was £4 million profit and loss and £2 million hotel revaluation. The Board by its admission admits the profit and loss has virtually disappeared because of continuing losses and the hotel revaluation can be certainly written off. So deduct these two items and you are left with £10 million and Delia/MJW have 66% of this.If Cullum was putting in £20 million he would clearly want control. There was clearly a lot of avenues to discuss and an agreement should have been feasible. It is total nonsense for people to say Cullum could not have taken over the other loans.

What makes me extremely angry is that Delia at the AGM went out of her way to make an opening pre arranged statement saying she had rec''d no offer from Cullum. She is playing with words. Any such approach would entail discussions etc and not a straight written offer etc. She also repeatedly states they will look at anything which would help the Club rather than benefit them financially.MJW kept asking what we could suggest. If the shareholders had been properly informed of Cullum''s interest there would have been many ideas but clearly they did not want to discuss.Additionally if they involve an investment company I assume they know these people require very substantial commission payments and would they prefer an unknown Russian wheeler and dealer rather than homegrown Peter Cullum.

The attitude of Delia and co has left a very bitter taste. I think it is now falling into place as to why the Turners left.

[Tangible Fixed Assets anyone? 0]

But who would buy Delia and MWJ''s block of ordinary shares in the future if they want any power? That''s why a large minority shareholding becomes worthless.

[Bobzilla 135]

[quote user="Desert Fox"]

[quote user="Bobzilla"]Just suppose that someone offered you money to do up your house, but in return he could do what he wanted with it. Would you take them up on that offer? What if he bulldozed your house and relocated it elsewhere? Its your house (you paid good money for it, and have not got anything back) but you have no control. That, to me, would be unacceptable. There are, and were, no guarantees of PC acting in the best interests of the club or its owners, and not in his own interests (you forget he has significant UK businesses that might benefit in some way from NCFC). Whilst I may not like the end result of the stalemate, I cannot blame Delia for not wanting to deal on PCs terms.[/quote]

Bobzilla,

Nice analogy, but in reality it is more like the house is falling apart and the guy that is doing the house up wants a pro-rata share in the house (which will increase in value as a result of being done up) rather than doing it up for free, which is what a £20 investment in the club without equity would amount to. I am not pro or anti-Cullum, just keen to point out the facts.

[/quote]

House isn''t falling apart. Other people in the same are(n)a are building their ''houses'' up more than we can afford to. The bottom line is that in the current climate, only two clubs in the country can compete without the backing of massively rich owners - Arsenal and Man U - and they do it by playing smarter than the competition - they buy an awful lot of young players for quite big money for their age, and then build them into superstars. No other team does that. They expect their rich benefactors to bail them out and buy expensive older players. And Man U has a global fan base like no other English club.

My point is that in our current state, we are a third tier English club. But that is not through lack of investment - that is the way the game is going. What we really need is to build up our Youth efforst, so that we do produce the Chris Sutton''s and the Darren Eadie''s again. That is how we compete, not by paying over the odds for over-rated older players.

 

[quote user="kdncfc"]

[quote user="Bobzilla"]Just suppose that someone offered you money to do up your house, but in return he could do what he wanted with it. Would you take them up on that offer? What if he bulldozed your house and relocated it elsewhere? Its your house (you paid good money for it, and have not got anything back) but you have no control. That, to me, would be unacceptable. There are, and were, no guarantees of PC acting in the best interests of the club or its owners, and not in his own interests (you forget he has significant UK businesses that might benefit in some way from NCFC). Whilst I may not like the end result of the stalemate, I cannot blame Delia for not wanting to deal on PCs terms.[/quote]

If you couldn''t afford your mortgage and someone offered to buy your house and offered to help you improve it and share the burden of running it you''d be a fool to turn them down, Delia can''t afford to run the club anymore and without something changing the club will end up in admin and she''ll end up getting nothing back, at least if she''d accepted Cullums offer we would have had a decent shot at getting promoted and she''d potentially end up getting far more money back.

[/quote]

All bought an paid for. And how much would you pay for a minority stake in a single person controlled football club, where you end up having to walk away (a la Turners) if you don''t agree and can''t keep upping the anti...

[Shifty Sid 0]

Trust me...Cullum is not the answer.shifty.sid@gmx.com

[WeAreYellows49 0]

[quote user="Shifty Sid"]
Trust me...Cullum is not the answer.

shifty.sid@gmx.com
[/quote]

Trust you?  Why should we?  So what is the answer oh wise one?

[Shifty Sid 0]

drop me an email at the address given, and I will tell you.

[WeAreYellows49 0]

[quote user="Shifty Sid"]
drop me an email at the address given, and I will tell you.
[/quote]

K mail sent.

[Barclay_Boy 0]

[quote user="nutty nigel"][quote user="WeAreYellows49"]

[quote user="Paint Me Yellow"]One reason I''m glad Cullum came out and said this is to put to bed the ridiculous notion that he wanted their shares for nothing. Its been such hard work trying to get people on here to understand this wasn''t the case at all.[/quote]

Agreed, but some will even now say he wanted the club for nothing.

[/quote]

And some will even now say that delia slammed the door in his face for selfish reasons.

 

[/quote]

yep, she slammed the door in his face for totally selfish reasons, Bang on.

[Barclay_Boy 0]

[quote user="KeelansGlove"]

Sorry if you had expressed an interest in pumping 20 Million into the club (given that the Turners got seats on the board for 2M) would you not find it disrespectful if the club were not able to find the time to meet with you in person ?

[/quote]

yep, sure would.

[whoareyou? 0]

[quote user="Canary Nut"]

But who would buy Delia and MWJ''s block of ordinary shares in the future if they want any power? That''s why a large minority shareholding becomes worthless.

[/quote]

For the same reason that others have bought shares? To own part of a club they love? Maybe as an investment were the club to become succesful? Maybe they could sell them off in small blocks to supporters? Maybe they will find oil under the pitch?

To say its worthless is nonsense!

[Barclay_Boy 0]

[quote user="Grando"]Is it any wonder that Cullum is apparently no longer interested? Delia and Michael have treated him with contempt.[/quote]

Grando, spot on.

[Barclay_Boy 0]

[quote user="Desert Fox"]

[quote user="Bobzilla"]Just suppose that someone offered you money to do up your house, but in return he could do what he wanted with it. Would you take them up on that offer? What if he bulldozed your house and relocated it elsewhere? Its your house (you paid good money for it, and have not got anything back) but you have no control. That, to me, would be unacceptable. There are, and were, no guarantees of PC acting in the best interests of the club or its owners, and not in his own interests (you forget he has significant UK businesses that might benefit in some way from NCFC). Whilst I may not like the end result of the stalemate, I cannot blame Delia for not wanting to deal on PCs terms.[/quote]

Bobzilla,

Nice analogy, but in reality it is more like the house is falling apart and the guy that is doing the house up wants a pro-rata share in the house (which will increase in value as a result of being done up) rather than doing it up for free, which is what a £20 investment in the club without equity would amount to. I am not pro or anti-Cullum, just keen to point out the facts.

[/quote]

Desert Fox, got it right, [Y] back to the drawing board Bobzilla [N]

[Barclay_Boy 0]

[quote user="kdncfc"]

[quote user="Bobzilla"]Just suppose that someone offered you money to do up your house, but in return he could do what he wanted with it. Would you take them up on that offer? What if he bulldozed your house and relocated it elsewhere? Its your house (you paid good money for it, and have not got anything back) but you have no control. That, to me, would be unacceptable. There are, and were, no guarantees of PC acting in the best interests of the club or its owners, and not in his own interests (you forget he has significant UK businesses that might benefit in some way from NCFC). Whilst I may not like the end result of the stalemate, I cannot blame Delia for not wanting to deal on PCs terms.[/quote]

If you couldn''t afford your mortgage and someone offered to buy your house and offered to help you improve it and share the burden of running it you''d be a fool to turn them down, Delia can''t afford to run the club anymore and without something changing the club will end up in admin and she''ll end up getting nothing back, at least if she''d accepted Cullums offer we would have had a decent shot at getting promoted and she''d potentially end up getting far more money back.

[/quote]

another one who''s got it right [Y]

[Barclay_Boy 0]

[quote user="Shifty Sid"]
Trust me...Cullum is not the answer.

shifty.sid@gmx.com
[/quote]

Trust me, Delia is not the answer

[gazzathegreat 0]

Excellent summing up Tim, making it absolutely crystal clear.

[Desert Fox 0]

Whoareyou,

I am afraid Canary Nut is correct about the worth of a minority interest.

Unless there is a liquid market in the shares (i.e. a good proportion of freely floating shares in a quoted market), having a minority interest is a loss making non-dividend company buys you a ticket to the AGM, but not a lot else.

The key here is liquidity. For a club like Arsenal where shares are openly traded, a potential bidder would hoover up small parcels of shares in the hope of building up a sufficiently sizeable stake to influence or gain a seat on the board. With a club like Arsenal, there is also the prospect of a dividend or at least a capital profit upon resale.

Buying illiquid minority interest shares in Norwich would effectively cost a lot of money with no real ability to counter vote against a majority shareholder nor any prospect of a dividend. Of course, this situation would change if the majority shareholders holding was broken up in to smaller parcels so that it became more worthwhile to acquire a minority stake.

In this respect, it is understandable that Delia would not want to become a minority shareholder. This is why there is surely a deal to be struck between her and Cullum. As Canary Nut has also pointed out, this could be done without the expenses of Seymour Pierce, who I would guess would be looking for somewhere between 10% and 15% of the transaction value.

[corbs 0]

Really refreshing to read this thred with cogent arguements and none of the usual banalities (until BB came in that is). Thanks. There is hope. 

[Desert Fox 0]

[quote user="Bobzilla"][quote user="Desert Fox"]

[quote user="Bobzilla"]Just suppose that someone offered you money to do up your house, but in return he could do what he wanted with it. Would you take them up on that offer? What if he bulldozed your house and relocated it elsewhere? Its your house (you paid good money for it, and have not got anything back) but you have no control. That, to me, would be unacceptable. There are, and were, no guarantees of PC acting in the best interests of the club or its owners, and not in his own interests (you forget he has significant UK businesses that might benefit in some way from NCFC). Whilst I may not like the end result of the stalemate, I cannot blame Delia for not wanting to deal on PCs terms.[/quote]

Bobzilla,

Nice analogy, but in reality it is more like the house is falling apart and the guy that is doing the house up wants a pro-rata share in the house (which will increase in value as a result of being done up) rather than doing it up for free, which is what a £20 investment in the club without equity would amount to. I am not pro or anti-Cullum, just keen to point out the facts.

[/quote]

House isn''t falling apart. Other people in the same are(n)a are building their ''houses'' up more than we can afford to. The bottom line is that in the current climate, only two clubs in the country can compete without the backing of massively rich owners - Arsenal and Man U - and they do it by playing smarter than the competition - they buy an awful lot of young players for quite big money for their age, and then build them into superstars. No other team does that. They expect their rich benefactors to bail them out and buy expensive older players. And Man U has a global fan base like no other English club.

My point is that in our current state, we are a third tier English club. But that is not through lack of investment - that is the way the game is going. What we really need is to build up our Youth efforst, so that we do produce the Chris Sutton''s and the Darren Eadie''s again. That is how we compete, not by paying over the odds for over-rated older players.

 

[/quote]

Bobzilla,

I think we will have to disagree about the current state of our finances.

Are you aware of the cash drain that is being placed upon the club by its non-football activities (e.g. the £2.5M loan that is repayable next month)?

Do you really believe that current levels of season ticket sales can be sustained in the face of a severe recession and poor football?

Do you think that performance will be improved by the inevitable cut in the football budget/player sales next year?

Are you aware of the banking crisis and do you not think that the clubs lenders might be getting very nervous about the clubs abiloity to repay its debts through making a profit on its land development activities?

Do you really think that there is a hope in hell of selling the land at a profit in the next 5 years?

Do you really think there is a queue of willing investors in championship clubs, when they can have their pick of premiership clubs?

Do you really think that the Board has a clue how it is going to resolve all of the above?

We will never sustainably compete with the big clubs again. Victory for us will be replicate where Fulham are now with the odd top half of the table season and good cup run. The last time that I looked, both Man Utd and Arsenal have extremely rich owners, but I do take your point the youth set up. We must do better, but FA rules do narrow the catchment area for local talent. I would favour a return to the Ken Brown/Dave Stringer era when we picked up thelikes of Crook, Bowen, Bruce, Watson, Gunn for next to nothing.

[The Butler 0]

A small question. Was it not Andrew Turner who was tasked with and spoke to Cullum? I seem to remember tis from somewhere but can''t find the details.

[KeelansGlove 0]

I believe it was Andrew Turner who was the only member of the board to have a direct contact with mr Cullum, before he left. Don''t know what that means !

[whoareyou? 0]

[quote user="Desert Fox"]

Whoareyou,

I am afraid Canary Nut is correct about the worth of a minority interest.

Unless there is a liquid market in the shares (i.e. a good proportion of freely floating shares in a quoted market), having a minority interest is a loss making non-dividend company buys you a ticket to the AGM, but not a lot else.

The key here is liquidity. For a club like Arsenal where shares are openly traded, a potential bidder would hoover up small parcels of shares in the hope of building up a sufficiently sizeable stake to influence or gain a seat on the board. With a club like Arsenal, there is also the prospect of a dividend or at least a capital profit upon resale.

Buying illiquid minority interest shares in Norwich would effectively cost a lot of money with no real ability to counter vote against a majority shareholder nor any prospect of a dividend. Of course, this situation would change if the majority shareholders holding was broken up in to smaller parcels so that it became more worthwhile to acquire a minority stake.

In this respect, it is understandable that Delia would not want to become a minority shareholder. This is why there is surely a deal to be struck between her and Cullum. As Canary Nut has also pointed out, this could be done without the expenses of Seymour Pierce, who I would guess would be looking for somewhere between 10% and 15% of the transaction value.

[/quote]

It''s still incorrect to say they are worthless. They may have not controlling power but you would still have a 30% stake in a Company who''s net balance sheet worth would then be £36million after £20million had been paid up on new shares issued. thts is the point i am making and for all Delia''s spouting about wanting to do the best for the club..she still only means the best for the club when it suits her! She has already admitted in the past they have no family to leave their wealth too...and in any case she could go back to work, as she puts it, do another tv series and a book and they would still be set for life..or they could carry on as they are and be remembered for being in control during the club''s worst period on the pitch in recent history!

[The Butler 0]

[quote user="KeelansGlove"]I believe it was Andrew Turner who was the only member of the board to have a direct contact with mr Cullum, before he left. Don''t know what that means ![/quote]

Well it justifies her statement of "not having spoken to" and perhaps explains why the Turners after their full investigation of NCFC left with the job not finished.

I don''t now what relations are like between PC and AT could that have been a problem?

[norfolkbroadslim 223]

Little Jack Horner sat in the corner,

Eating his Christmas pie,

He put in his thumb and pulled out a plum,

And said "What a good boy am I!"

[:|]