'Share LiverpoolFC' piece from today's Guardian...

[vanishingpoint]

Matt Scott, The Guardian, Tuesday 28 September 2010

 

Credit where it's due as Liverpool fans save for a stake in Anfield

 

Liverpool supporters' group takes first step towards setting up a financial foundation for fans to invest in the club

 

"The ranks of the Kop could soon contain Liverpool investors if a savings scheme for supporters proves successful.

 

The Liverpool fans' group Spirit of Shankly-ShareLiverpoolFC has taken its first step towards setting up a financial foundation for supporter-led investment in the club.

 

The society has teamed up with the Merseyside-based Partners Credit Union to provide a safe house for supporters to save towards the goal of taking up a stake in Liverpool. The Liverpool Supporters' Credit Union scheme was launched on Saturday with the aim of making investing in Liverpool more affordable.

 

Fans will now be able to save towards having a stake in their club, something that the current sums involved put out of the reach of all but investment institutions and the super‑rich. "If you have 100,000 people all contributing £500, you can have £50m(error)," said Partners Credit Union's chief executive, Tracy Fletcher. "Some credit unions have 15,000 to 20,000 members, this could be much bigger."

 

One obstacle to the success of the union is that regulations restrict membership to people living and working on Merseyside.

 

However, the credit union movement hopes that legislation which may come into effect next year will permit wider membership – a development that would open the door to the Spirit of Shankly group's tens of thousands of members worldwide."

[Barnesey]

Unfortunately, this is not enough. £50m would by a stake in the Club but control would reside elsewhere and a minority interest is, in my view, a waste of time.

 

I signed up for the original idea and believe that fan ownership can work but, unfortunately, we need to own all of the Club and this is not feasible.

[vanishingpoint]

Unfortunately, this is not enough. £50m would by a stake in the Club

 

The "£50m" figure is a typo on behalf of the Guardian. I left it in, with a correction

 

The actual figure is £500m.

[goatboy59]

Think the figure quoted there is right.

 

1,000 x 1,000 is a million.

 

100 x that is 100m. Since we're only talking about a stake of £500, it's half that.

 

50m.

 

You needa million people to give 500 for 500m, surely?

 

That or Mr Jones was wasting his time in Warwick Bolam High!

[Liverpool lad]

At this moment in time, Share Liverpool is nothing short of a pipe dream.

[23CARRAGOLD]

1,000,000 people paying £500 is what they are looking for. It was mentioned the other day. It is doable like but it will take a lot of organising and sorting out to do with fans as split as ours at the moment.

[goatboy59]

To be honest I thought 100,000 was a bit optimistic.

 

A million?

[Graham Smith]

Club's not worth £500m.

 

It's not worth £250m

[Liverpool lad]

Or the whole world puts a pound in and we will be the richest club on the planet

[vanishingpoint]

Think the figure quoted there is right.

 

1,000 x 1,000 is a million.

 

100 x that is 100m. Since we're only talking about a stake of £500, it's half that.

 

50m.

 

You needa million people to give 500 for 500m, surely?

 

That or Mr Jones was wasting his time in Warwick Bolam High!

 

Aye, the sum's correct. I seem to remember, however, that the initial target-sum proposed by Share LFC was more in the £150m region?

 

Imagine ShareLFC having a 10ish% share which £50m might provide: I wonder how effective that would be in having a realistic influence on the running of the club?

 

A million people(or groups) paying £500 each to be in a position to buy outright, seems pretty off the scale in terms of anything achievable.

[23CARRAGOLD]

Club's not worth £500m.

 

It's not worth £250m

 

The debt placed on the club is worth more and needs to be cleared by any incoming ownership, including the supporters!

[23CARRAGOLD]

Club's not worth £500m.

 

It's not worth £250m

 

And I'm just going by what Rogan Taylor was saying Saturday morning on Radio City Graham. He was going on about getting a million people to throw in £500 and then we can buy the club.

 

If theres some sort of dispute about what hes saying then I'd advise someone to tell him to button it with his big comments on platforms like the radio now that we are aligned with them as a group.

[goatboy59]

Or the whole world puts a pound in and we will be the richest club on the planet

 

or Huang's Plan as it was also known!

[Graham Smith]

The debt placed on the club is worth more and needs to be cleared by any incoming ownership, including the supporters!

 

Nah, RBS might take less than their debt.

[goatboy59]

The debt placed on the club is worth more and needs to be cleared by any incoming ownership, including the supporters!

 

Someone was trying to explain to me on Saturday that RBS could take the club over, and just get as much as they possibly could for it.

 

And then Hicks and Gillett will still have to pay any leftover debt.

 

Afraid I've now got in the habit of ignoring anyone who tries to spread even a little sunshine, but he seemed convinced and quite erudite.

[goatboy59]

Nah, RBS might take less than their debt.

 

It wasn't you was it? ;)

[Graham Smith]

It wasn't you was it? ;)

 

It was until you got to erudite.

[vanishingpoint]

A supporter-owned club is the ideal to many of us, however:

 

How do you decide the command structure? The board? The mangers? By democracy? Is any vote involving 1,000,000 world-wide (as that is what it would have to be) voters who may, or may not subscribe to "the Liverpool way" many of us believe the club should be about, really feasible or desirable??

 

How much do we pay the board? The manager, staff, players?? Do we vote on that too?

 

There has to be a danger of any pluralistic organisation being stymied by a lack of dynamism, by too much voting by committee.

 

There'd have to be some level of decision-making autocracy within the co-operative set-up- I guess it's a question of 'how' and 'how much'.

[goatboy59]

Presumably like anything else you vote for the person(s) you want to run things and if they're shit at it you vote them out a few years down the line.

[Trucker Paddy]

Nah, RBS might take less than their debt.

 

What about the Cayman debt, whats the deal with that, who is it secured against, us or the parasites?

[vanishingpoint]

Double post.

[vanishingpoint]

Presumably like anything else you vote for the person(s) you want to run things and if they're shit at it you vote them out a few years down the line.

 

Which, like parliamentary democracy leads to the elected making potentially damaging short-term decisions to maintain power/favour etc.

 

Our great strength was stability. We'd do well to enshine that in any new organisation.

[PaulMcC]

Presumably like anything else you vote for the person(s) you want to run things and if they're shit at it you vote them out a few years down the line.

 

Sounds themost plausible option.

[PaulMcC]

BARCAP return to Huang, Rhone Group and the UAE? | live4liverpool.com

 

According to reports, the firm leading the sale of Liverpool Football Club, Barclays Capital, are returning to previous bidders to see if any are willing to revive their interest in taking over the club. It has been reported that BARCAP have contacted the Rhone Group, the private equity firm that offered £110m for a 40% stake back in March, to see if they would consider making another offer. They have also apparently contacted Kenny Huang, the Hong Kong based businessman who made his interest in buying the club public back in August, as well talking to interested buyers in the Middle East about a possible takeover. Another possible link is a ruling family in the UAE , although most interest has been put off by the asking price that both Tom Hicks and George Gillett have put on the club.

[goatboy59]

Which, like parliamentary democracy leads to the elected making potentially damaging short-term decisions to maintain power/favour etc.

 

Our great strength was stability. We'd do well to enshine that in any new organisation.

 

Hopefully with legally air-tight clauses that would spark an EGM to get 'controversial' changes voted on.

 

We can call it the That'showyoudoitmooresyoufuckingbellend Clause.

 

Hmmm, might need a bit of work.