Joel Glazer sets fan forum date (4th June)

Tom Cato

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Will many/any of you buy the shares?

I’m pretty broke after the last year but I could get 1/2k together and I’d like to be a small part of any fan movement that goes ahead
I'll probably put £100-120k in, depending on currency valuation in NOR by then. I'm very excited by this.
 

United442b

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There was always going to be major scepticism after 16 years with zero communication from the Glazers. I expected nothing from the fans forum today other than a PR stunt, which this 'fans share' idea might be.

However, any kind of share scheme is much more than I was hoping for and it could be a significant step forward.
 

Ali Dia

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Not having a go at the fans at the meeting or anyone personally - but I'm astonished anyone can say anything positive from this.

Make take is:

- Glazers retain ultimate power and dismiss concerns about the debt they foisted on the club.

- Glazers agree to expand fan forums and share schemes that have no real power. Anyone thinking these things could ever override the Glazers' is deluding themselves.

- Glazers say 'major investment in the stadium and train facilities'. Sounds good but there's no committment to exactly what or by when they will do it. Or any explanation why they let the the stadium and carrington fall into disrepair.

- Glazers commit to investing in the team this summer. Why just this summer? Why not a commitment to always ensure United compete? And we all know they won't fund the level of investment needed.


This is bollocks. Trying to appease the mob. They were shaken after the Liverpool game got stopped. This is not the time for the fanbase to take the foot off their neck - now is the time to apply more pressure and fight harder because this is the first ever time Glazers have been forced out into the open.
 

diarm

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Perhaps you shouldn't take the Caf so seriously. You can take my username off your dartboard :lol:
You flatter yourself.

I reckon that might be the first time I've ever replied to a post of yours unprompted.
 

cyberman

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Below is the Twitter handle of Ian Stirling for anyone that's interested. He was also present during the fan forum.

No owner would ever agree to this. Im all for change but this is wishing for unicorns.
Do fans really want to invest in the club? We were trying to kill off sponsorships last month!
 

TheReligion

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You flatter yourself.

I reckon that might be the first time I've ever replied to a post of yours unprompted.
Let me know when you've finished dick measuring.

I'm a grower not a shower anyway so it's all a little pointless ;)
 

Fluctuation0161

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Morality aside, carrying debt is not unusual for a large entity. Interest rates are incredibly low making the servicing costs negligible. While some would argue that over time the costs could have been put toward the purchase a world class player, it's unlikley that the club would have put those funds into savings year over year so it's basically missing out on a squad player each season, something we can leverage our academy for instead. If the argument is that it could have been put to stadium upkeep or training ground improvements, again, the marginal annual amount would not likely have a significant impact.

There may be some tax advantages to carrying the debt when it comes to the dividend payments but I'm not 100% sure it applies to United.
Interest rates change. There is already talk of an increase.

The debt will be there indefinitely.
 

Dr. Dwayne

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Substitute club for business and I'm sure you will find plenty of examples where something big and popular lost value and income.

Maybe 10 billion pounds over 50 years to United is non impactful, and like you say the numbers don't exactly match up exactly regarding impact on the budget however that's still ten billion (almost) out of the club for something the glazers did just to be able to buy us. Maybe I'm just old school but I like having a plan to pay off my debt at the very least. Could take a few decades but the goal should be to head in that direction.
Personal and business debt are two very different things.

I agree that the club being debt free would be great but I don't ascribe to the view that carrying the current debt is severely detrimental to the club or threatens its existence. The value of the club these days far exceeds the debt.
 

Flying high

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Morally, sure.

Legally? No. The only way the Glazers pay off the clubs debt is if they leverage another one of their sport clubs or businesses with a enormous loan to pay off the clubs debt. That is not remotely realistic unfortunately.
It's not the only way though is it. They could issue some more stock and instead of pocketing all the cash they could pay off the debt.
 

Flying high

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I will yes.

Well could get a Caf pot going and buy a load
I wouldn't want to discourage this, but maybe consider investing through MUST or similar as I expect they'll try to organise something.

*edit: Just saw the MUST announcement.
 

georgipep

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I definitely have zero clue how business works! Hypothetically if they were feeling incredibly generous could they not use the money raised as a loan for club infrastructure projects and just never ask for repayments? Or even just write it off? There must be some way to inject that money into the club - it’s finance after all!
There are mechanisms, whether it is donation or forgiven loan, that's true but also entirely irrational for nay businessman to use such mechanisms.
 

georgipep

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Is it though?

Let's say the Glazers have 1,000,000 votes and the fans have 1,000,000 votes. All it takes for the Glazers to get their way is for 1 solitary fan to vote against the interests of the club.

Taking the ESL as an example, the Glazer might conceivably have won by 1,000,032 to 999,968 despite 99.9968% of the United fans being against it.

I hope you're right. But nothing in the public statement suggests there are any meaningful contingencies in place.
So? What would you want? Even in a 50.01% fan ownership model where the Glazers have 49.99%,they'd still only need 0.02% to get decisions in their favour.
 

Pscholes18

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I'm calling bollocks on the fan ownership. Just something to wet the beak while they give feck all about the club for the next 16 years.

For the match going fans what's the deal with the stadium upgrades??.... is it because it's falling apart or is it because you guys want to see more modern accommodations/amenities?
 

The Cat

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I'm calling bollocks on the fan ownership. Just something to wet the beak while they give feck all about the club for the next 16 years.

For the match going fans what's the deal with the stadium upgrades??.... is it because it's falling apart or is it because you guys want to see more modern accommodations/amenities?
It really is in a bad state
 

Champ

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So they want the fans to buy shares which in turn will create more money for the club/Glazers in order to feel like the fans are part of the club again?
Is that right?
 

VP89

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There's feck all about time scale here, which makes me feel they weren't really held to account.
 

Dr. Dwayne

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I'm calling bollocks on the fan ownership. Just something to wet the beak while they give feck all about the club for the next 16 years.

For the match going fans what's the deal with the stadium upgrades??.... is it because it's falling apart or is it because you guys want to see more modern accommodations/amenities?
There is a massive leak in the roof over one stand. Desperately needs repairing.
 
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There's feck all about time scale here, which makes me feel they weren't really held to account.
Any one who thinks this was anything more than an attempt to passify the angry fanbase is a fool.

They were finally scared into coming out of the shadows - now the fanbase needs to reject this bullshit and continue the protest in ways that gets their attention.

I don't remember fans ever saying they want to work with the Glazers - as far as I'm concerned it's still Glazer Out and always will be.
 

Tincanalley

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But to get an equal number of votes as a the Glazer family , wont fans have to buy an equal amount of shares as the Family? If the business is worth £3 to £4 billion , does that not mean fans will have to raise up to £2 billion? If fans can only raise enough to buy 10% of the shares, they wouldn't be entitled to an equal number of votes, or is there something I am missing?
And does it open the door to the red knights etc ?
 

Sandikan

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Did anyone really think they were going to come out and say
  1. We'll be aggressively operating in the transfer market, after Kane, Varane, Sancho and that's just for starters, this summer, with loads more year after year
  2. We'll put 100m into the stadium and surroundings post haste
  3. We'll immediately redeuce the debt to zero
etc etc?
 

stampedingviking

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Won't commit to servicing their debt and feels their dividend payments are fair. They can f*ck off. Scum.
No real financial reason to pay off the debt. Just wait for those new owners everybody seemingly wants and see how much they take out, will make the Glazers look like good owners.
 

Bilbo

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To anybody that took part in the peaceful parts of those protests - well done. You've achieved something real here and that's something to be proud of. My hat is off to all of you.

To those still throwing scorn on this - hold your horses. This is the best realistic outcome. Of course the Glazers need to build bridges and stick to promises but let's at least wait until they do or don't fulfil those before you cast judgement. What's happening now is a good thing.
 

stampedingviking

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Is there uncertainty around the future of the game? There is certainly uncertainty around the money being paid and recieved by various parties in football but the game remains quite strong especially in Europe. The more they delay paying off the debt , the more we end up paying interest and never doing anything to bring it down. I would have had it as demand number 1 personally. A debt free united will always earn more than enough money to be stable and strong. This road could lead to very dangerous things.
A debt-free United would then be paying large sums in tax, very possibly larger than repayments.

You really should learn financials before just spouting off that debt is bad.
 
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Gavinb33

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No owner would ever agree to this. Im all for change but this is wishing for unicorns.
Do fans really want to invest in the club? We were trying to kill off sponsorships last month!
Exactly this people had a list of demands few really were realistic when you think about it, the fact that look like they might act on some is a plus.

I surmise for a lot of the people that are the loudest online if we buy a few players that will sate them, for me it won't be enough I'd like to see the stadium and training ground upgraded more than a shiny new toys for Ole i feel they will have longer term benefits.
 

peridigm

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I certainly wouldn’t be doing it to make cash! The glazers will surely hold us back a long while yet.

Just hopeful that if the fans got a bit of power back we can help steer the club in the right direction and keep vetoing the super league and whatever other American twists they want to put on us in the future.

Is crypto not making all of you wildly rich? I can’t get my head around it. My friend has had some since Silk Road. Jammy.:lol:
My reply was in jest. Crypto is all good. Not rich yet. I’m down now if I sold but I’m hodlin’. Invested around $6k for the long haul. Crypto is here to stay.
 

Sultan

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A debt-free United would then be paying large sums in tax, very possibly larger than repayments.

You really should learn financials before just spouting off that debt is bad.
Please enlighten us on how paying off debts would cost us larger tax repayments than actual debt repayments (interest)?
 

Mickeza

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Please enlighten us on how paying off debts would cost us larger tax repayments than actual debt repayments (interest)?
I think the idea is tax is just dead money whereas paying off debt could have been borrowed money that went into furthering the business - debt on infrastructure for example. Alas that argument doesn’t work for the Glazers as that debt is purely there for the privilege of their lovely ownership. To be honest the debt was a massive problem in the 5-6 years after their ownership with the massive interest payments and far lower revenues - it isn’t really a problem now. They’d probably just take out bigger dividends if it wasn’t there anyway.
 

Garethw

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You can guarantee that, can you?

At least give this a chance, if nothing changes then have a go.
If you choose to believe a word that these fecking parasitic vermin say then that’s up to you.

I’ll give it a chance when they act rather than talk thanks.
 

Sultan

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I think the idea is tax is just dead money whereas paying off debt could have been borrowed money that went into furthering the business - debt on infrastructure for example. Alas that argument doesn’t work for the Glazers as that debt is purely there for the privilege of their lovely ownership. To be honest the debt was a massive problem in the 5-6 years after their ownership with the massive interest payments and far lower revenues - it isn’t really a problem now. They’d probably just take out bigger dividends if it wasn’t there anyway.
I see it differently buddy. Paying more tax means a healthy business. Yes, it could be argued the owners would be taking/entitled to more dividends if they so choose.

@stampedingviking argument was completely different which just makes no sense to me as a layman. We do have a number of accountants on the site who could clarify.

I quote

"A debt-free United would then be paying large sums in tax, very possibly larger than repayments.

You really should learn financials before just spouting off that debt is bad."