To fans sceptical of those of us whom distrust the 80% owners

It must be all above board for the purchase to have gone through.

But realistically is there anything wrong with that?

If you took over running a pub from admiral taverns as an example, they charge you rent for the pub but you use that business premises and equipment etc to pay that rent etc.

Surely not a million miles away from that.

If you flip the coin and say, OK the owners pay the instalments out of other funding sources but then take that out of the club profits as a return on investment you end up in the same financial situation in terms of bank balance. So it's just probably the easiest way of shifting the funds. Maybe tax benefits thing? Not sure.

Personally, don't think there is much wrong with it tbh.

 

Wasn’t that money an agreed dividend from the club to the Crynes after promotion? Can’t see the Crynes agreeing to it otherwise, given they own 20% of the club

 

Heard that by fans a few weeks back that club money has been used to pay installments. Didn't really look into it but not good if true. And billionaires on paper maybe.

 

Not uncommon in Football or business in general

 

That thread title seems to suggest you trust the 20%ers.

None of us should trust any of them.

 

Most billionaires are billionaires only on paper. They don't generally have bank accounts stuffed with billions, it's all tied up in investments, property and their own business interests. I'm not suggesting our owners are billionaires or not as I've never attempted to find out, I'm guessing Pacific Media and Newcity Capital are registered in China or Hong Kong and wading through that is next to impossible.

 

Hong Kong.

Though the vehicle for our ownership is a completely separate company.

 

The practice certainly isn't illegal. And its certainly quite common in VC takeovers and particularly in the US.

Its what pushed much of the angst against the Glazers. Though this group haven't heaped us with debt (yet), they have drained pretty much all the cash reserves inherited through losses, and this £750k has sped that up.

The Crynes couldn't stop them doing it, 80% stake is enough to have complete operating control.

In essence, its the same as taking £750k out of the club and paying themselves as it saves on their debt.

So not only have they not fully paid for the club as it is, they've also saved £750k of theirs (whoevers) money too (maybe more if we look at future accounts), and having got Patrick to write off significant debts too.

All while quibbling about £150k a year in rent.

 

Just checked the accounts and the club paid a £750,000 instalment to Oakwell Holdings Limited relating to the purchase of the club, on behalf of BFC Investment Company Ltd, which is the Hong Kong registered company that is the ultimate parent of the club.

The accounts also state that the club won't seek reimbursement of these funds from BFC Investment Company Ltd, so the cost was recognised as an expense in the accounts for that year.

So, in summary, yes, they used the operating funds of Barnsley Football club to pay one of the purchase instalments.

 

The difference in your example is that the rent for the pub is a genuine running cost associated with running the pub.

The equivalent comparison is that if you'd paid Admiral Taverns a fee to purchase the lease of the pub in the first place, you've now used the operating funds of the pub to cover the cost of your initial investment. Essentially, you've spent none of your own money to acquire the benefits of running the pub, but have divested profits that the pub generated to cover this cost after the event.

 

In the Cryne's statement they released
was it court statement ?

The Cyrne's said that payments for the club "cannot be paid out of clubs funds "
if it was written in the contract to buy the club that this was so.
are they forbidden from doing so ?

i presumed the court case was over this.
the Cryne's blocking the consortium from doing this and the consortium refusing to make the payments believing once they have agreed and signed to buy the club and have a majority shareholding they can do whatever they want.

very sad as they are literally getting the club for nothing plus taking a million out of the club through presumably player sales every year to pay the debt
as people have said presumably anyone could have taken over the club on this basis
i have always said they will never put a penny of there own money into the club
and as of now that seems to be the case

they took advantage of a dire situation as theses vulture predator's do and reading a post on another thread they deliberately dragged the sale on because of the impeding death of the owner to get a better deal.

 

It isn't the same thing at all. Buying the club should come out of their pocket and paying the bills should come out of the club's pocket.

 

If that's the case, why would the Crynes accept payment through that route?

 

The 750,000 was a separate payment presumably for promotion
i believe in a interview in the chronicle Conway said this was agreed to
whether the Cryne's believe this to be the case is unclear
it is unclear to me (fans) whether the Cryne's statement related to that payment or not
it was not specific on the details

The club's payment was a separate 5 step year plan
which in the court documents said was extended and lowered about a year and a half ago as i presume they couldn't or refused to make the payments.
they don't seem to have made any payments at all for that debt.
hence the court case

 

The actual note in the accounts referring to this for those interested. Looks like there was an additional debt of £6.5k also written off too.

 

in the chronicle about a couple of weeks ago
Conway said he does not owe the club any money
he said the court case is Cryne's v barnsley fc whatever its called the Hong Kong company
who actually owns the club ?
are these people just front men(strawmen)

or are they hiding behind a offshore shell company to make out it is not them owing the money

 

The nature of the payment conflicts with the general commentary in the accounts about Covid bringing a liquidity challenge and it being the most challenging period for the club in generations. They chose to report a £280k loss for the year by including the payment as an expense, rather than a true underlying profit of £470k before tax.

If the liquidity situation was so severe then there's no way that you would consider making a payment of this kind, although it may have been made prior to the Covid outbreak.

 

There's no publicly available information available on the Hong Kong company which is the ultimate parent company, so we won't get to see any information about what's going on in there.

The only thing we can monitor is whether or not funds were being taken out of the BFC operating company, albeit the expectation is that this would have been in the form of dividends.

By using the club to loan money to the parent company, and subsequently write off those debts, it's essentially a way for the 80% ownership to withdraw funds from it without having to pay an equivalent dividend to the Cryne family (as any dividend would have to apply equally to all holders of a specific class of shares). Ironically, it's the Cryne's (via Oakwell Holdings) who benefitted from this payment but there's nothing to stop them making another loan payment on behalf of the Hong Kong company at any stage and then writing it off.

Prior to this set of accounts, there had been no indication that club operating funds were being utilised in this way, so the worst they could have been accused of is reneging on the agreed purchase cost of the club from their own available funds. This puts a very different spin on things now, as they've opened the tap on syphoning funds away from BFC for purposes unrelated to the operation of the football club.