Originally Posted by
Caversham Green
Right, a couple of observations here:
First of all, the club is worth nothing because debts exceed assets and it has been trading at a loss for many years. That means the yams are being asked to pay for nothing but, as truehibernian says it's an emotional thing so they can be part of their club - fair play there.
This carries the same flaws as the proposed Sevco share issue - a permanent capital injection for transient benefit. The money will be used for annual costs such as wages and once it runs out they have to find more money for the next lot of expenses. Keep issuing shares and they dilute the value from an investment point of view so they can expect diminishing returns. From the emotional point of view the fans are just being asked to pay more for their football - it's not much different from putting ticket prices up.
They should issue a prospectus - presumably that's what the leaflet will be. Should be interesting reading.
The numbers don't really add up. They expect to raise £1.79m from the sale of shares at 11p each - that's just under 19.7m shares. There are currently just under 147m shares in issue (nominal value 10p each) so assuming it's a new share issue that would be nearly 12% of the club rather than the 10% they claim (they do say over 10% but I would have expected them to use the 12% figure).
If it's Mr Romanov selling his shares as Brian McLauchlin suggests, the money will go to Mr Romanov, not the club.
Finally (for now) a phrase that stands out for me is "a potential opportunity for the Board to test the willingness of supporters to get involved". If the issue fails (this time or in the future) Mr Romanov has every right to say "Well I gave them the chance to save their club, but they weren't interested." More than a hint of a threat there.