Hicks Texas Rangers seized by authorities

[PaulMcC]

He wants out of Liverpool as well as Texas Rangers and Dallas Stars.

 

Hicks wants out of sport full stop and to concentrate on his other businesses which incidentally i don't think are doing too badly.

 

Do you know this for certain, coop?

 

Why has his other sports club had to taken from him? Could he not just sell it?

[Ezekiel 25:17]

He wants out of Liverpool as well as Texas Rangers and Dallas Stars.

 

Hicks wants out of sport full stop and to concentrate on his other businesses which incidentally i don't think are doing too badly.

 

It's all hearsay obviously Coop but I heard something a little while back saying he was adamant he was staying put, had no intention of selling up till the price was right, which it never will be, was inferred he was looking to get the stadium still. The situation of course is completely unstable and is changing by the day, so regardless of what he wants It may out of his hands.

[Trumo]

My mind goes back to the day I came back home from work late, turned on the news, and it was announced that DIC had walked and that Gillett was days away from a deal with a new partner in tow. To say I was stunned is an understatement. I was very uneasy about what the future would hold in the hands of someone who'd already been dismissed once, and another whom I had to Google to learn more about. What I learned filled me with trepidation to say the least.

 

Message to ManU fans:

You think you got it bad with the Glazers? At least they don't have a history of fucking up sporting institutions the world over like Tom Hicks has. The guy is a human wrecking ball that leaves a trail of destruction wherever he goes.

 

Message to those involved in legal cases against Hicks:

Good luck chaps. Take the fucker for everything he's got, and then go for some more. You KNOW you want to.

 

Message to David Moores:

I don't wish ill like some people on this forum who have made outrageous comments, but I suggest you slink away quietly into the night. Never show your face at Anfield again, because you won't like the looks on peoples' faces for one thing. They'll always remember both what you did and didn't do.

[Trucker Paddy]

It's all hearsay obviously Coop but I heard something a little while back saying he was adamant he was staying put, had no intention of selling up till the price was right, which it never will be, was inferred he was looking to get the stadium still. The situation of course is completely unstable and is changing by the day, so regardless of what he wants It may out of his hands.

 

We lost £54m for the year ending July 09, we're on target to lose £80m for this year, due to exiting CL early and the fact we did'nt get as many Televised games and we finished 7th,next year is gona be even worse as we've no CL at all,the situation is unsustainable and 6/8 more months of losing money at this rate we're going into administration unless theres a sale.

The Yanks have skimmed millions from the club through this cayman loan and the back handers that no doubt were passed in the constant spunking money to architects on the stadium, they might get to next march if thats how long the extention is, but if they do we'll be taken from there hands by hook or crook, IMO the first person to offer £420m for the club will be our new owners.

[coop]

Do you know this for certain, coop?

 

Why has his other sports club had to taken from him? Could he not just sell it?

 

Hicks is trying to sell the Texas Rangers and the land surrounding it as seperate deals.

 

He knows whatever money he makes on the sale of the Texas Rangers he will have to pay back to his lenders whereas the money he makes from the sale of the land will go to him.

 

I don't know the situation as well as some but i think Hicks is trying to get a deal through which means he gets more money for the land but his lenders do not accept this deal hence the delay.

 

The MLB want this sorted though so are also trying to push through the deal.

 

It's all hearsay obviously Coop but I heard something a little while back saying he was adamant he was staying put, had no intention of selling up till the price was right, which it never will be, was inferred he was looking to get the stadium still. The situation of course is completely unstable and is changing by the day, so regardless of what he wants It may out of his hands.

 

Last i heard mate they were still trying to get finance sorted for the stadium as they know once thats up and going then the club will be worth more.

 

They do want out though and this is one of the reasons Casey Coffman left Hicks Holding as she is rumoured to want to stay within the sporting business world whereas Hicks wants out.

[Lopez Ufarte]

We lost £54m for the year ending July 09, we're on target to lose £80m for this year, due to exiting CL early and the fact we did'nt get as many Televised games and we finished 7th,next year is gona be even worse as we've no CL at all,the situation is unsustainable and 6/8 more months of losing money at this rate we're going into administration unless theres a sale.

The Yanks have skimmed millions from the club through this cayman loan and the back handers that no doubt were passed in the constant spunking money to architects on the stadium, they might get to next march if thats how long the extention is, but if they do we'll be taken from there hands by hook or crook, IMO the first person to offer £420m for the club will be our new owners.

 

 

I'm with you on this Paddy...£420's the price and if they get this figure we will be sold, regardless of whether the purchaser builds us a new stadium..

[Ezekiel 25:17]

Hicks is trying to sell the Texas Rangers and the land surrounding it as seperate deals.

 

He knows whatever money he makes on the sale of the Texas Rangers he will have to pay back to his lenders whereas the money he makes from the sale of the land will go to him.

 

I don't know the situation as well as some but i think Hicks is trying to get a deal through which means he gets more money for the land but his lenders do not accept this deal hence the delay.

 

The MLB want this sorted though so are also trying to push through the deal.

 

 

 

Last i heard mate they were still trying to get finance sorted for the stadium as they know once thats up and going then the club will be worth more.

 

They do want out though and this is one of the reasons Casey Coffman left Hicks Holding as she is rumoured to want to stay within the sporting business world whereas Hicks wants out.

 

Well, yeah pretty much what I thought, they want out but are not willing to go at the price being mentioned, looking towards the stadium as a big money way out. The situation, like you need telling, is fucked beyond all comprehension, it's not like there's a flood of offers at there door and the ones they do get, well, if it's to there liking they won't give a flying fuck about the credentials, it could well be out of the frying.. actually I won't even finish that sentence, I don't think that's possible and the thought is truly petrifying. I cannot see us having any kind of stability realistically for many, many years.

[a stoner]

Hope they find a buyer who will pay off the debt and pay ren and stimpy a quid between them the pair of fuck wits.

I hope rabid dogs eat their fucking balls.

[me1]

Thanks for posting that. Much appreciated.

WTF happened to due dilligence here? Please, don't tell me.

[coop]

Well, yeah pretty much what I thought, they want out but are not willing to go at the price being mentioned, looking towards the stadium as a big money way out. The situation, like you need telling, is fucked beyond all comprehension, it's not like there's a flood of offers at there door and the ones they do get, well, if it's to there liking they won't give a flying fuck about the credentials, it could well be out of the frying.. actually I won't even finish that sentence, I don't think that's possible and the thought is truly petrifying. I cannot see us having any kind of stability realistically for many, many years.

 

There is supposed to be interest in the club mate but Broughton has made it clear that no business will be done via the media.

 

For all we know Broughton could be in discussions with a few interested parties but because its not in the newspapers does not mean its going ahead.

 

No-one knew of the Kuwait or the Goldman Sachs interest until a while after when it was reported in the papers.

 

For me there is many different paths the new ownership can take but whatever way we go the debt will not disappear.

 

The new owners whoever they will be will no doubt put some debt on the club and in all fairness i have no problem with this as long as it does not harm the team.

[Reacher]

Utter cunts all three of them, My contempt doesnt seem to hold any bounds, i get more and more wound up with every article i read like this.

 

Thanks DM.

[Trucker Paddy]

There is supposed to be interest in the club mate but Broughton has made it clear that no business will be done via the media.

 

For all we know Broughton could be in discussions with a few interested parties but because its not in the newspapers does not mean its going ahead.

 

No-one knew of the Kuwait or the Goldman Sachs interest until a while after when it was reported in the papers.

 

For me there is many different paths the new ownership can take but whatever way we go the debt will not disappear.

 

The new owners whoever they will be will no doubt put some debt on the club and in all fairness i have no problem with this as long as it does not harm the team.

 

I've no doubt unless were very lucky that theres not gona be debt involved, but what the last 2 years has shown is the leverage buyout does'nt work, especially with us, the mancs are a different case due to the fact they have the stadium/team/demento, we need a stadium, we need players and most likely a manager. so whoever buys us, no way possible it can be as bad as what we've got.

Gillet hass been very silent while his fat partner has been mouthing off, anybody heard anything about him?

[andrew78]

Ive fucking had it ,they can sell the all the star players ,just fuck off and die you cunts then we can start again.We going to be a mid table team by the time they have raped us somemore

[Albertini]

Hicks said in an interview in the US he wanted to get out of sports (the one where he said he had "paid a terrible price").

 

This is what was written:

 

'This isn't my life'

Along with Manchester United, Liverpool — not Chelsea, not Arsenal — is the great potential revenue-producer in the EPL. Man U has become Asia’s team because it was the best in the world as satellite television boomed worldwide. Similarly, during the first wave of global cable expansion in the 1970s and 1980s, Liverpool was Europe’s pre-eminent club.

 

The deal that George Gillett brought to Hicks in 2007 — about $400 million, with almost nothing down — was too good to miss out on. Hicks and Gillett had combined forces to buy Meatpackers Swift & Co. from Conagra in the late 1990s, worked well together, and made a killing. (Gillett is still a director of the company.) And unlike American sports teams, Liverpool was a good business. “At various times, the Rangers and Stars have had positive EBITDA [earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization],” Hicks says now. “Liverpool has maintained significant positive EBITDA, and with the new stadium, that will virtually double. Our EBITDA the first year will be over $200 million.”

 

Hicks and Gillett bought Liverpool the same way that they did everything: leveraging it with as much debt as they could. That extended Hicks’ precarious position even further. Now he again needed to dip into his personal funds to pay the installment on the interest and keep his money-losing U.S. sports teams operating. “Debt is generally good if you’re building a business,” Cramer said. “But you run into a credit crunch when you can’t get it extended. Then people stop spending money because discretionary income is down. Corporate spending gets hammered. And it happens that you’re not winning a ton of games with either team. People don’t come to see losing teams, and they don’t come when they don’t have jobs, and meanwhile, you can’t get credit. It’s a perfect storm.”

 

Hicks saw it coming. “It was a question of, can the earnings grow fast enough to cover the debt that we knew was coming due,” he said. He tried several financial maneuvers, including a public stock offering that would have been backed by Hicks’ half of Liverpool. “It would have been a unique global sports offering that Goldman [sachs] thought would be very well-received,” he said. “We were going to sell roughly 40 to 50 percent of the stock and pay down the debt to a very manageable number.” But in March 2008, while he waited for the Liverpool audit report to be finalized, the market fell dramatically amid concerns over the value of mortgage-backed securities and the collapse of investment bank Bear Stearns. “During all that time, I was feeding [Hicks Sports Group] from my own money,” he said. “It got to the point where it would have been putting in good money after bad. Some of my closest advisers recommended that I [default] earlier than I did.”

 

As Hicks recounts the story, he’s in his living room watching Liverpool play a UEFA match. When Fernando Torres breaks free and scores, Hicks grins broadly, though the goal is disallowed. He loves this part of sports — watching his teams play, feeling a sense of personal achievement when they win — almost as much as he loves buying low and selling high. But a relentless pounding about his failure to improve Liverpool’s performance or invest in new players seems to have dampened his enthusiasm.

 

“I can still be a fan,” he said of his exit strategy, which will almost certainly involve selling all three entities over the coming months. “But I’ve paid a terrible price. I’m 64 years old. I don’t want that anymore. Jerry Jones is a good friend of mine, but his life and his family’s life is the Dallas Cowboys. Mark Cuban, the Mavericks are his life. This isn’t my life.”

 

The question is then if his sports team in his own backyard is being repossessed what chance does he have in dictating a sale price on LFC.

 

The problem in the sale of his baseball team is that he has deflated the price for the team because he has inflated the price of the land which he is selling together.

 

The buyer is buying both the land and the team together but the creditors of HSG will only get the money back on the sale of the team.

 

They think Hicks has shafted them. (no surprise there then)

 

Bottom line seems to be that the old cunt has run out of money to put into sports teams.

 

Which is why beggars cant be choosers when it comes to the sale price of LFC.

 

It's quite clearly a fire sale of all sporting assets.

 

This leveraged buyout model works ok with businesses whose function is to generate profit to pay leveraged loans back, but doesn't work on sports teams where profits drive team improvement.

 

He is fucked and it couldn't happen to a nicer fella.

[tobycatz]

DM gets the lions share on here for the sorry mess were in and rightly so, but lets not forget dirty Parrys role in our demise , afterall he was employed to be the brains of the outfit.

[bonesman]

Well looks like by thursday we'll have something concrete to go on regarding the sale..

 

Bud Selig should act now and seize Rangers

 

In 18 years as Major League Baseball commissioner, Allen H. "Bud" Selig has rendered hundreds of important decisions about the game's future. And all of them seem to have one thing in common: They satisfy no one.

He's had to cancel a World Series. He's had to end an All-Star Game without a winner. He's had to agree to less-than-perfect drug testing policies just to get some kind of drug policy in place. He's had to agree to testify to Congress and then got scolded on Capitol Hill.

He has another decision to make this week: Possibly reclaiming the embattled Rangers franchise.

This one offers him the chance to look decidedly different. It offers him the chance to look not only right, but also popular.

As the* Rangers sale process gets uglier by the day, Selig will convene the regular quarterly owners meetings in New York on Wednesday. He will brief owners on the stalemate between MLB, which has yanked the process out of the hands of Hicks Sports Group, and a group of 40 lenders, led by Monarch Alternative Capital, a predatory hedge fund.

He will canvas the room, caucus with owners and explain MLB's options in this sticky situation.

The first option would be to reach some kind of compromise with the lenders in which everybody, including MLB's other owners, leave some money on the table. Not. Going. To. Happen.

The second would be to simply acquiesce to the lenders and throw the process open all over again, essentially freezing the Rangers' operations for the foreseeable future and putting the Rangers' deeper into debt with MLB.

And there is the last option: He could invoke the "best interests of the game," clause in his charter, force Tom Hicks out and take control of the club. Dashing as it may sound, it's mostly a procedural move that would then allow MLB to also freeze the lenders out while expediting the deal between HSG and the Chuck Greenberg/Nolan Ryan-led group.

It is the last option that is so tantalizing.

In one broad sweep of his hand, Selig could be done with the headache that has been Hicks' involvement in baseball. He could fulfill every in-debt American's dream of being able to tell predatory lenders to shove off. And he could hand the Rangers franchise to Ryan, the Texas legend, who seems to be the dignified front man the franchise and the sport could sorely use.

It will also undoubtedly bring about a round of lawsuits and attempted legal action by soured creditors. But if Selig takes action - any action - lawsuits are going to start flying like Neftali Feliz fastballs. After all, it's the only pastime more American than baseball.

In the meantime, however, the Rangers would have stability. Greenberg/Ryan and their investors would have the ability to move forward with making the Rangers part of the MLB pension program. That would benefit the employees. They could start stadium spruce-up projects like contracting for a more up-to-date video board. That would improve the fan experience. They could make the additional investments necessary to improve the team on the field via trades and aggressive drafting which may result in a playoff run for the first time in more than a decade. That would benefit the entire community.

By the time the lawsuits get sorted out - if the lenders choose to keep chasing HSG's bad debt - the Rangers might just be emerging as one of the strongest franchises in baseball.

Imagine that. While the lenders would seek to prove that there was more money available in the sale, MLB might just prove that the smarter long-term decision is having a robust franchise in its largest one-team media market.

And what could be more in the "best interests of the game" than that?

**

Posted:* 05/10/2010 11:40 PM

Column by EVAN GRANT / The Dallas Morning News | egrant@dallasnews.com

 

Dallasnews.com : Bud Selig should act now and seize Rangers

[Plewggs]

Don’t forget, Coco is a Chartered Accountant.

 

His reasons for recommending the Hicks offer instead of DIC were;

greater commercial acumen, sports-club ownership experience and financial muscle.

The five other chartered accountants on the board approved this astounding piece of financial analysis.

 

On the bright side, imagine the consequences of Coco and that crew completing ya tax return.

[Timão]

He wants out of Liverpool as well as Texas Rangers and Dallas Stars.

 

Hicks wants out of sport full stop and to concentrate on his other businesses which incidentally i don't think are doing too badly.

 

They are doing very well, he just does not do sport very well...to put it mildly.

 

I think he will go, question of when not if, just a question of what state we will be in by the time he does.

[Coro]

I maybe wrong but surely this is the reason they're in no rush to sell -

 

A total of £233.996m is owed to RBS, in addition to an inter-company loan of £144.441m owed to “Kop Cayman”; a company owned by Gillett and Hicks based in the Cayman Island for tax reasons; a company that have loaned Liverpool FC £144.441m at an interest rate of 10%. This is the “own money” that Gillett and Hicks claim to have put into the club. In reality, they’re just charging the club 10% interest for lending that money through an offshore limited liability company that they aren’t even personally liable for – Liverpool FC are.

 

Liverpool FC are not paying the interest off on that £144.4m however. It is being charged as a “compound interest”, meaning the interest isn’t paid, but is instead “rolled up” to the grand total. For example, this year (if I’ve got this right):

 

£144.4m @ 10% interest = £14.44m payable this year.

 

Instead of paying that £14.44m, it is rolled onto the total making the outstanding debt owed to Kop Cayman £158.88m. The following year this is then charged at a further 10% interest:

 

£158.88m @ 10% interest = £15.88m payable next year.

 

Instead of paying that £15.88m, it is rolled onto the total making the outstanding debt owed to Kop Cayman £174.76m. The following year this is then charged at a further 10% interest:

 

£174.76m @ 10% interest = £17.76m payable next year.

 

Instead of paying that £17.76m, it is rolled onto the total making the outstanding debt owed to Kop Cayman £192.52m etc etc etc...

 

The debt soon spirals out of control, as you can see; and don’t forget, this only concerns the £144.4m owed to Gillett and Hick’s Cayman Islands company – it doesn’t concern the huge £234m owed to RBS.

[bonesman]

Had the exact same thought when i read that somewhere yesterday..

[ngogswilly]

£174.76m @ 10% interest = £17.76m payable next year.

 

Instead of paying that £17.76m, it is rolled onto the total making the outstanding debt owed to Kop Cayman £192.52m etc etc etc...

 

The debt soon spirals out of control, as you can see; and don’t forget, this only concerns the £144.4m owed to Gillett and Hick’s Cayman Islands company – it doesn’t concern the huge £234m owed to RBS.

 

Sweet Jesus! It's like a prison shower scene.

[Trucker Paddy]

I think your looking at this the wrong way, IMO that's why they have to sell. LFC is worth £350m, if there lucky and get a vanity purchaser they'll get £420m,and walk away with £20m each plus what they've skimmed, the way debt is building up we'll go bust before next season is over, RBS are the main creditor they will sell the club for what there owed and cayman will get scraps if there lucky as the clubs value isn't worth the debts. They want to sell and will before this happens, what they wan is I'm sure of this is a percentage of ticket sales of the new stadium for the 1st ten years, we will be sold but I doubt it will be before September.

[ZonkoVille77]

scary reading no matter what way it's looked at.

[redrosetints]

Great stuff. We need that unholy alliance of Moores, Morgan and Miskelly, plus whoever else has some cash to come together for the good of the club.

 

Anyone got Warren Buffetts phone number ?

[Coro]

I think your looking at this the wrong way, IMO that's why they have to sell. LFC is worth £350m, if there lucky and get a vanity purchaser they'll get £420m,and walk away with £20m each plus what they've skimmed, the way debt is building up we'll go bust before next season is over, RBS are the main creditor they will sell the club for what there owed and cayman will get scraps if there lucky as the clubs value isn't worth the debts. They want to sell and will before this happens, what they wan is I'm sure of this is a percentage of ticket sales of the new stadium for the 1st ten years, we will be sold but I doubt it will be before September.

 

At the end of the last financial year the club stood to owe them £144 million.

 

That figure will rise the longer they are here.