Thetownend.com

Patey the debt-buster
           
           


  SIR William Patey has revealed that Sir Martyn Arbib is willing to write off the debt owed to him by Swindon Town, and the new Robins chairman has encouraged Andrew Fitton to follow suit and help the club emerge from their transfer embargo.

           

http://www.thisisswindontownfc.co.uk/news/headlines/9998185.Patey_the_debt_buster/?ref=rss
           
           
           

Bit cheeky, obviously no idea of who is owed what but Arbib is a whole lot richer than Fitton and I'm sure he'd miss the money a lot less.

This might be a bit of a dim question but .....

When he says the debt is worthless .... Surely £1m owed is £1m owed isnt it?

Well, if the debt is in the way of personal loans to STFC, and they have the best interests of STFC at heart, they know the debt will never be repaid.

But getting it off the balance sheet will get the club below the cap which has led to the embargo.

Looks like this is the way to keep PdC on board

I don't see how having debt written off will affect the embargo. It's calculated on revenue, not debt.

I read that as '£1m never repaid' is essentially the same as writing off the debt.

Its great Sir Martyn is prepared to to do such a thing, but surely Fitton et al invested so they'd have first dibbs  on any 'success' in the first place.

Meh, who knows. Wait and see...


I heard the radio interview. Essentially because with the debt gone  Black would probably release more cash for equity.

This is pure guesswork, but when you write off a liability the credit is taken to the company's P&L.  For the accountants out there:

Dr  Liability (B/S)
Cr  Income  (P&L)

Might it be that the credit arising on the write off of the liability is counted towards the 'Revenue' figure?  It would be strange if it did - but you never know.

Not sure, but I presume the debt is inflating the revenue so getting rid will get us below the threshold

May be talking bollocks

Patey = Derren Brown

Back in the room

Hi I'm William Patey and this is Cillit Bang.

One squirt and BANG! the debt is gone.

Since when has begging your creditors to waive the debt counted as "debt busting?" If this was Diamandis doing it we'd all be in fucking meltdown

Bad feeling about this

I have a feeling that something may have been lost in translation here.  So far as I'm aware - although I could be wrong here - Sir Martyn Arbib came on board as an investor, not as a fan (although he may well have become one since).  There were no tales back in 2007 of a boyhood dream fulfilled, or how he spent many happy Saturday afternoons watching Don Rogers and Roger Smart from the Town End.  Why would he write this off?  I would not expect him to.

Isnt he only allowed in the country 30 days a year or so?  Can be that much of a fan.

On the understanding that if successful his share of the club would be worth more than the amount he writes off and attracting further investment will help them achieve that.

"I expect to have a lot better relationship with Paolo than I ever had with the Taliban"

Really ?

Is it ok for me to admit, that was my question?

Why is the investment now classed as a loan? I thought these guys knew a return from a football club is highly unlikely

I don't think for one minute that they have been throwing money at it without the intention of getting it back at some stage.

"I get on fine with the manager in the sense that he doesn't actually try to kill me with IEDs or sneak mortar attacks" seems a reasonably low base to start from

Start Low .... Aim High .....

Difference is that Diamandis would just be begging, whereas in this instance Patey is speaking for the major shareholders who presumably want to do this - Patey hasn't just decided to pluck this idea out of thin air and float it in the Adver. Although I hope he's not doing so (as someone else said) to try to apply public pressure to Fitton and Wray which would seem a bit unfair. He may, though, just be trying to explain in fairly simple terms why a fairly dry thing around debt restructuring
a) makes sense for the club and the investors
b) is a good thing

Is that Patey or the Taliban mortar attacks? :)

The last couple of paragraphs of the article spell out exactly what this is about; Arbib will put more money in to the club as soon as Fitton and Wray agree to write off some of their investment in the club. They must have refused to do so hence taking it public to apply more pressure. Wouldn't surprise me if Fitton and Wray sever all ties with the club, leaving us with Arbib and Black who appear willing to put more money in.

Well I fail to see how they will get it back. And if they do then it sours the whole thing for me. I hoped they were just wealthy men who wanted a football club as their hobby. If this is not the case eventually it will kick the club in the balls and it will be a right fucking mess again.

I thought it was always clear the debt was re-structured in that way. But obviously not.

On the contrary

Because they want their money back they have an incentive to get the club running at a profit which will put us in good stead for the future. I'd be more concerned if we were just their play thing.

Of course people who invest money into something want a return. Surely that's the whole point of business? It some ways it's much like gambling though. You place your bet and you may get a return you may just lose the money you have put in. One can assume that Fitton is holding out for a redeveloped CG in order to re-coup his investment and there is nothing wrong with that.

If you want a return on your money you don't buy a football club. Many have tried and it always ends in a mess

Dicanio said to be in good spirits ahead of this afternoons presser by Sam Morshead on twitter.  Hopefully that means hes happy with the new boy and not imminently fucking orf.

That's just not true Arriba. For the 2010-2011 season 5 Prem clubs made a profit. Last season Newcastle made a $50m profit.

Can't find anything for the lower leagues but don't see any reason why it should be any different. I imagine Black and Co. have done their homework as well, they ain't stupid.

Black and co would've bought this club with the intention of making a profit when they sell it on.

This is Swindon Town we're on about,a club that was up shit creek and riddled with debt when they took over. I cannot see how this club will see a return on their investment,not to mention being self sustaining and able to compete in the Championship without significant funds being made available for players. The manager likes spending and our gates do not sustain that already.
The board have put loads into the club but i'm buggered if i know how they will get it back let alone make a profit.

I know they aint stupid which only makes me more dubious.

They've outlined their plans plenty of times already.

And us being 'Swindon Town' means bugger all. The current lot have absolutely nothing to do with previous mismanagement.

I know they have nothing to do with previous mismanagement,but ploughing money into STFC doesn't look a good business decision to me.

Every big occasion for Swindon town I.e wembley, COC cup v villa have proved that Swindon town can generate more interest and support. The sell out crowd against villa shows exactly what sort of support we can generate. Will be a great message to the board of what is there if the ambition is also there.

I hope also we are in great voice win or lose.

As I understand it if the debt levels were reasonably clear then any new investor would be able to come in and know that his money is not coming in and going into a black hole to repay debt as the club is heavily in debt, if there are small debts then an investor sees an opportunity of his money being able to make a difference and to help build the club up

I like the bit about looking for certain type of people to join the board that can add some expertise

From what Hodgetts has just said about Fitton's response to a request for an interview on the writing off debt issue, it sounds like there might be a bit of wrangling behind the scenes still between the major investors and Fitton/Wray

Was he told to go away?

Not surprised if he was to be honest.

In no uncertain terms by the sounds of it. He reported Fitton said "he wasn't prepared to negotiate via the media". And rightly so. Fair enough asking the question, mind

Hmm, this was always my fear...not yet a rift I suppose :) I don't really understand the rational between asking someone who has sunk a load of cash in to forget about it so some other people can sink a load of money in and reap any rewards.

Still, I probably understand 2% of what is going on. Ignorance is bliss.

Well I can see the rationale, so long as you retain an interest of course (not you, the putative investor) as it does help clean up the balance sheet. A load of debt hanging around makes it less attractive to other investors. Equally, as someone said the other day, Fitton and Wray probably aren't in quite the same position as Arbib and Black are to write off debt in the hope of a better overall outcome. Although I'd imagine they're both in a better position to do so than any of us :)