Colos Short and Curlies

Sturridge didn't go anywhere did he? Could see him rocking up at Old Trafford for a couple of years

Not too worried about this season, it's next season that worries me. For all the good performances against the top 6 they resulted in 3 points. The 14 games against Brighton, Palace, West Ham, Bournemouth, Cardiff, Fulham and Huddersfield gave us 17 points. Whilst Bruce is a far inferior coach to Rafa I actually think he is more likely to get a result at home against all of these than Rafa's system + our players would be. So we are going to take a few heavy beatings, but we'll also win a few more games just by not having such a systemic approach to games. The front 3 + Carroll will get chances and will score goals. For the casual fan I'd actually wager that match day will be more fun this year, but its not sustainable and once Bruce gets his 'methods' ingrained we will see results suffer - ala Pardew.

Does this mean we've gone full circle and have fully reinvested the Carroll money?

Hoping to see this thread at the top of page tomorrow with 100's of posts of celebratory emoji's as he is carted back to Forest. Him leaving + a coupe of loans the height of my ambition for tomorrow

Anyone of the front 3. It was said earlier but it will be like Ba-Cisse-Ben Arfa when the front three look class despite the manager. It does of course rely on Longstaff/Hayden/Shelvey et al providing a solid base like Cabaye and Tiote did

I'm sure Jetro Willems is a country singer character from the Fast Show

Yup. Albeit not all out and out left wingers all of the below played there at some point. Ginola, Robert, N'Zgobia, Cabella, Thauvin, HBA, Gouffran, Obertan, Marveaux Sissoko spent most of his time here out on the wing. Fabrice Pancrate probably played on the wing that one time. Wasn't he on the right though? You could argue Bernard as well, wasn't he signed as a winger who we converted to a full back?

I know NUFC are associated with a love of a number 9, we must be pretty close to having the same affection for erratic French left wingers

They had a vat problem as well if memory serves. He dances in the grey when it comes to tax that much is clear

He'll be playing up front for them the way their summer is going

Not sure it's that. @Colo's Short and Curlies knows more about it. You're right, its not tax evasion (well from what we know it wouldn't be). Its a case of paying tax in the wrong place. As its VAT and it is a matter of record from HMRC that SD pay and have always paid VAT to them then its safe to say that we take tax evasion off the table. What is important is whether Belgium (and potentially others) believe that SD deliberately neglected to register for VAT there in order to pay less VAT in the UK. If so then the fines/interest will be more punitive than if its a genuine oversight. As HMRC advised that SD contact all 27 countries back in 2017 this argument is weak. As an aside, reading on the NUFC/HMRC investigation, if HMRC have a case then this COULD be deemed evasion as the case centres around NUFC funnelling money and wages through different sources in order to reduce tax. (How the hell has my life come to be discussing VAT on a football forum!)

I have an auditors certificate and 'Big 4' trained :-) May not be independent though

30 (random) x 50k x 52 weeks is only 78m. Penfold and the tea lady are on a canny screw like. Add on National Insurance and you get to around £85m, then signing on fees will be there as well. I'd put money on us inflating signing on fees which is in part a further payment to agents that we don't want to disclose

I'd counter that Ashley has been a scourge of NUFC, as a provider of low cost sports wear in one of the less well off areas of the country you can say he has benefited the portion of the city who have no interest in football. The Sun went beyond football with their reporting and it really was a city wide impact. As for do non-football fans in Liverpool buy the sun? When I lived there in the early 00s you couldn't find a newsagent who sold it Edit: As a football fan and a NUFC fan of course I hate everything he stands for a refuse to spend a penny in his stores.

Kid's clothes & shoes are zero rated in the UK aren't they? Don't know about the rest of the EU, but this suggests not. Would think that's a significant percentage of sales. The UK and Ireland are the only countries who have a zero rate for VAT, it is a reduced rate across the EU - on average this would be around 10%. So yes, if children's clothing make up a significant amount of EU sales then the amount that they can reclaim from HMRC in proportion to the total bill goes down dramatically.

Any idea how much he'll claim back from HMRC? Its really difficult to put a decent guess on it as what we don't know is the breakdown of the £600m bill. Trying to be a bit realistic, 25% of the bill being interest etc would be sensible so £480 would be VAT. Belgian VAT is 21% and as most of these sales were post 2011 UK VAT has been 20% for the full time - the UK VAT paid on sales would be £457m. Putting together SD would have to find the £120m fine/interest and £23m additional VAT (Assuming HMRC accept that the VAT was paid in error and not as a malicious attempt to pay less VAT in which case they would levy their own fines...... appreciated. Would the same apply to any other countries that do the same? Absolutely. The UK is one of the lowest VAT rates in the EU, Germany is lower at 19% but from memory that is the only one less than 20% and I'm ignoring any zero rated goods in the UK as I don't think SD will sell many of these but if they do then the impact is a lot worse than my first example (yay). Its the fines that get you, Belgium is one of the more lenient countries. I keep mentioning Italy and this being massive, if they think that its a deliberate attempt to withhold tax there the fines can be 400% of the original VAT. As I mentioned on Friday I'm unwinding a total of €2m in VAT etc across the EU and this was on £700k paid to HMRC originally

Any idea how much he'll claim back from HMRC? Its really difficult to put a decent guess on it as what we don't know is the breakdown of the £600m bill. Trying to be a bit realistic, 25% of the bill being interest etc would be sensible so £480 would be VAT. Belgian VAT is 21% and as most of these sales were post 2011 UK VAT has been 20% for the full time - the UK VAT paid on sales would be £457m. Putting together SD would have to find the £120m fine/interest and £23m additional VAT (Assuming HMRC accept that the VAT was paid in error and not as a malicious attempt to pay less VAT in which case they would levy their own fines......

I'm going to try and dig around a bit, but a very quick glance around does suggest that Belgium wont be an isolated case. Between 2010 and 2015 SD charged UK VAT on all sales to EU countries, HMRC recommended that they contacted all 27 countries to clarify the position - SD appealed against this and won in a UK court but that doesn't mean that an EU court wouldn't over rule this (As the Belgians have done). SD have a distribution centre in Austria so I can definitely see that being an issue (and the Austrian tax regime is tough). France and Germany unfortunately I think will be pretty much covered as I think SD have registered companies there so not much in the way of sales from the UK. Fingers crossed Italy get interested, if so expect this total bill to be north of €1bn, the question would then be how much is VAT (and in part reclaimable form HMRC) and how much is fines and interest

Unfortunately I think mike is right on this one. f*** off Rafa plays politics, always pushing for more. You're right, he does but he always pushes for more for the club first and foremost I actually do think Rafa had settled in China early, but only after it was obvious that it was a lost cause trying to push us forward. Turning down a number of jobs in Europe supports this, but if Ashley had turned round in June and said let's do it 80% your way he'd still be here

Both happened yesterday didn't they? Id say KB knew that the fans would latch onto the tax so has given them something else to focus on

That bit is very clever wording that actually says he was willing to put in 23million to support Rafa but no mention on what he is doing now. We all know how it pans out anyway, budget is cut by 23million on the sly and magically MA was due a 23million payment against his loan which he didn't take to fund the transfer. Reality is 'has he bollocks' but the accounts suggests he has

Hope you mean millions instead of thousands I do - its Friday, its late and my dealings in this have been in the thousands (my defence your honour)

Ongoing. Although the mounts here are nowhere near the Belgian amounts, if found guilty we could see some serious charges levied against Ashley and Charnley and we would be sold and would be hit with some hefty FA/PL penalties as it is genuine tax evasion and fraud that is being investigated, not a technical oversight

Righto - and warning this is pretty boring tbh so only read on if you have insomnia, So this all centres on online sales made to customers in Belgium, basically in every EU country there is a threshold of annual sales (Belgium is €35,000) after which you have to register for VAT in that country and pay local VAT at their rates - you don't pay it to HMRC as well. Back in 2017 HMRC lost a case where they wanted all SD sales to be under UK VAT and outside of the above rule, from this point a Belgian bill was always going to come (I'd actually wager that SD sell sufficient values to have this situation in every EU country) and they really should have been accounting for it (hence my earlier comment that they've known about this for 2 years). Certainly up to 2017 all VAT would have been paid to HMRC an this will be reclaimable. Hopefully (for the innocent shareholders) they have continued to pay VAT on Belgian sales to HMRC after this point and if so then is also fully recoverable. The problem they have though is that VAT in Belgium is 21% and they can go back to the point at which it should have been payable - 1% on all sales to Belgium over say 10 years is a lot of VAT to pay. The authorities can also levy fines and interest on the full amount that should have been paid, not just the difference in VAT rates. My gut feeling is that SD have not disclosed the bill to Belgium, and it has been the Belgian authorities who have made the first move. If so, and with SD being a plc with massive EU sales, the fines will be significant - in Italy it could be up to 500% of the liability in fines and interest on top. I've lived this for 2 years after joining an online retailer with a total turnover of £20m, unwinding a bill of £2m - 30% of this being fines and interest after we made the disclosure and it being a genuine oversight of a company with no accounting function prior to me joining. Boring bit over. Ashley can't be found personally liable for any of this so talk of tax evasion etc is fanciful. He does however have responsibilities as a director to make good decisions and this along with the HoF debacle could lead to him losing his position in SD. Impact on NUFC? HMRC will have looked into our transactions after finding irregularities in SD and it wouldn't surprise me if this was what started the whole transfer investigation. I think apart from this investigation there interest in us is done. Will it lead to him taking more cash out of NUFC? Unlikely as you would actually want to keep yourself and SD as low on cash as possible until it is resolved so you can plead poverty and an inability to pay. It could actually make him more likely to go on a spending spree. Could there be more? Potentially - all 27 EU countries will be looking at this unless SD are paying VAT there already. If Italy get involved it would dwarf this. The way its been handled today may lead to the shareprice absolutely tanking on Monday. I don't think SD will be in the FTSE100 for long if it does. They won't pay €600m, with the HMRC reclaim it will be €200-€300m max imo. It will be a pain in the ass for the finance team anyway. What we should all hope is that this is just the tip of the iceberg on how they account for things and a new auditor rips apart the acquisitions they have made. on its own its a technical correction to make, but if there is anything else dodgy going on it will now be found and if serious fraud charges may follow on the directors with prison being a possibility as well as a ban on being a director for any UK company for a while and failing the F&P test. Takeover impact? I can see him having enough of public life and retiring to the Bahamas so it could make him a more receptive seller TLDR - on its own its an irritation to him but it may be the thread that when pulled makes the whole thing collapse

He wont be