17 September 2010

The Glazers appear to have been able to wipe out a substantial portion of Manchester United debt by buying back PIK loans which carry a high interest rate.   The significance of this development is that it undermines recent arguments that the Glazers would be obliged to sell the club because of the cost of servicing its debt.   It may help to explain the relatively relaxed response to the recent increase in interest on the PIK loans from 14.25 to 16.25 per cent.

The loans were available cheaply during the global financial crisis in 2008 when they fell sharply in value.   It is believed that the Glazers bought 20 per cent of the loan issued by Red Football Joint Venture which controls the club.  The size of the PIK loans has been reduced from an estimated £228m to £182m.    The debt at maturity would be £523m compared with £654m, a saving of £131m.

What this effectively means is that the Glazer family are paying themselves interest on the money they borrowed to buy Manchester United.   Fans are left worried about where the cash to pay off the PIK loans is coming from.

Bryan Glazer (L), Avram Glazer and Joel Glazer (R). Photograph: Martin Rickett/PA

Wed. 25 Aug 2010

Manchester United's owners, the Glazer family, have suffered further embarrassing financial difficulties after four more of its US shopping malls recently fell into default on their mortgages.

The sport is more popular than ever -- but the losses keep mounting. What can be done to fix the business?

There was no way European football fans could miss Adidas' (ADDDY ) new Roteiro ball during the month of June. Thanks to a deal between Adidas-Salomon and the Union of European Football Assns., the silver and black Roteiro was the only ball to appear on the pitch during the European football championship in Portugal from June 12 to July 4.

 A large number of Brazilians view Turkish clubs as their second favorites because of the Brazilian players in those teams. Brazilian journalists order jerseys from Turkey; people in the Middle East, Balkans and Turkic republics talk a lot about Turkish teams -- however we fail to market our soccer. While the highlights of even the Portuguese league are aired by Eurosport, in spite of the fact that Portugal trails Turkey in the rankings, there is nothing whatsoever about Turkish Super League on foreign TV stations.

26 Temmuz 2010

The total debts at Brazil’s leading football clubs has risen 11% according to new research published by

futebol.finance.com.

The turnovers in the Premier League are relatively stable, particularly given the broadcast revenue and growing global popularity of English football.

1: Main revenue streams
a) TV: Sky and Setanta have paid £1.7 billion for the current domestic Premier League rights, while the overseas rights are now worth £625 million.

b) Sponsorship: Clubs are free to negotiate their own sponsorship deals and these can be extremely lucrative, with Manchester United's shirt-deal with AIG worth £56.5m over four years.

 Crystal Palace have been saved from extinction after an agreement in principle was reached for CPFC 2010 to buy the club and Selhurst Park.

Administrator Brendan Guilfoyle gave them until 1500 BST on Tuesday to reach agreement with Lloyds Bank or he would start to liquidate the club.

Chelsea strongly defended their financial structure and have rejected any suggestion that the club's estimated debt figure of £730 million could ultimately jeopardise their participation in European competitions.

By Jeremy Wilson
Published: 10:10PM BST 08 Oct 2008