quayside

Of course no one knows if we'd have gone out of business if Ashley hadn't bought the club. But when he did buy it our balance sheet was insolvent and that means that someone had to guarantee to fund the club for the next 12 months or the auditors wouldn't sign it off as a going concern. If its not signed off as a going concern every secured creditor has the right to foreclose. So who was going to give that guarantee if Ashley didn't? I do, and the answers is no. ;-)Football clubs only go out of business when their debts exceed the market value of the club in a solvent state, and a solvent NUFC is worth a more than £75m. Things have changed now though, because the clubs debts have nearly trebled in three years and now exceed its market value. didn't quayside point out that we were insolvent and ashley had to prove he had the funds to keep us going to the auditors ? And? you said the answer was no as solvent clubs could blah blah blah................our balance sheet wasn't solvent. No I didnt. Do you want me to rephrase it so you can have another stab at the reading thing? Football clubs only go out of business when their debts exceed the market value of the club in a solvent state, and a solvent NUFC is worth a more than £75m. that to me doesn't describe an insolvent balance sheet. Did I say the club had to be solvent at the point of sale? It all boils down to getting a return on your investment. An insolvent business isnt automatically a dead duck; it can still represent an attractive acquisition if the potential future income exceeds its liabilities. The debt levels merely determine the price, and since NUFC was sold for £135m there was clearly a long way to go before it became worthless. had ashley done due dilligence hall/shepherd would have got nowhere near that figure. would it be going to far to say ashley was the only one interested and he quite possibly wouldn't have bought had he known the full scale of things............then what was there to keep us solvent ? Yup good points. Others had a look but ran a mile after doing due diligence. Lerner paid £66 million for Villa and it was solvent and had very little debt, different business model I know but were we worth double the price? Would be astonished if Ashley would have bought us knowing what he knows now.

Of course no one knows if we'd have gone out of business if Ashley hadn't bought the club. But when he did buy it our balance sheet was insolvent and that means that someone had to guarantee to fund the club for the next 12 months or the auditors wouldn't sign it off as a going concern. If its not signed off as a going concern every secured creditor has the right to foreclose. So who was going to give that guarantee if Ashley didn't? I do, and the answers is no. ;-)Football clubs only go out of business when their debts exceed the market value of the club in a solvent state, and a solvent NUFC is worth a more than £75m. Things have changed now though, because the clubs debts have nearly trebled in three years and now exceed its market value. didn't quayside point out that we were insolvent and ashley had to prove he had the funds to keep us going to the auditors ? And? you said the answer was no as solvent clubs could blah blah blah................our balance sheet wasn't solvent. No I didn’t. Do you want me to rephrase it so you can have another stab at the reading thing? I read what you said exactly the same as Madras reads it - so yes please rephrase so we can have a stab at the reading thing.

Of course no one knows if we'd have gone out of business if Ashley hadn't bought the club. But when he did buy it our balance sheet was insolvent and that means that someone had to guarantee to fund the club for the next 12 months or the auditors wouldn't sign it off as a going concern. If its not signed off as a going concern every secured creditor has the right to foreclose. So who was going to give that guarantee if Ashley didn't? This is not a point that can be validated and doesn't really add to the debate; we were never signed off as anything other than a going concern, given guarantees from the owner. The same guarantees could well have been forthcoming from the previous owners. The fact is we were truly exposed by relegation; don't let the anti-Shepherd view cloud your objectivity. If you read my posts on other threads you will find that I am not anti Shepherd or pro Ashley, imo both have done some good things and some bad. Your idea that the Halls and the Shepherds would have guaranteed to fund the club is certainly interesting, given their track record on making their own funds available for investment. And since Ashley had so much already tied up in the club how exposed were we by relegation in reality? He had to get us back up and didn't asset strip anywhere near as much as he could have in the summer to try and have every chance of succeeding. This is all the difference between what could have happened and what did happen. Who knows what could have happened? We do know what did happen, which was relegation which exposed the club. Under Ashley's ownership. To be clear I certainly blame Ashley for relegation. Any sort of stability in the club last season would have ensured our survival. But how exposed we are having been relegated with Ashley remaining as owner is debatable. And to continue on your theme what did happen was that he didn't find a buyer and he did make a decent effort at giving us a platform to go back up.

Of course no one knows if we'd have gone out of business if Ashley hadn't bought the club. But when he did buy it our balance sheet was insolvent and that means that someone had to guarantee to fund the club for the next 12 months or the auditors wouldn't sign it off as a going concern. If its not signed off as a going concern every secured creditor has the right to foreclose. So who was going to give that guarantee if Ashley didn't? This is not a point that can be validated and doesn't really add to the debate; we were never signed off as anything other than a going concern, given guarantees from the owner. The same guarantees could well have been forthcoming from the previous owners. The fact is we were truly exposed by relegation; don't let the anti-Shepherd view cloud your objectivity. If you read my posts on other threads you will find that I am not anti Shepherd or pro Ashley, imo both have done some good things and some bad. Your idea that the Halls and the Shepherds would have guaranteed to fund the club is certainly interesting, given their track record on making their own funds available for investment. And since Ashley had so much already tied up in the club how exposed were we by relegation in reality? He had to get us back up and didn't asset strip anywhere near as much as he could have in the summer to try and have every chance of succeeding.

Of course no one knows if we'd have gone out of business if Ashley hadn't bought the club. But when he did buy it our balance sheet was insolvent and that means that someone had to guarantee to fund the club for the next 12 months or the auditors wouldn't sign it off as a going concern. If its not signed off as a going concern every secured creditor has the right to foreclose. So who was going to give that guarantee if Ashley didn't?

How exactly? Because it exists and has not been paid off? Ashley has taken the sting out of it by converting it in to interest free loans to him, but the debt still exists. When Ashley bought the club the debts we had didn't vanish. Quayside points out that Ashley is now in for £300m. £134m for the club suggests he's now forked out £166m on debt/further investment. NUFC-finances says he took over a club where Shepherd had built £70m of debt. This suggests that Ashley is the one to have built up a further £96m of debt in just 3 years. £26m more than Shepherd managed in 10 years. And that's without paying any interest payments or any dividends and all he's gained by spending much more than Shepherd is relegation. But Shepherd is the one who's bust us? Aye, right! The £300m is an estimate because we don't know what he put in during 2009 yet, but your point is valid. The debt has increased substantially since he took over. Here's a simple table showing our finances leading up to Ashley's takeover in Summer 2007. 2003/2004 2004/2005 2005/2006 2006/2007 Profit/Loss Profit £4.4 million Breakeven Loss £12 million Loss £33 million Net Worth £29 million £29 million £17 million Negative £16 million Wages/Turnover 50% 58% 62% 71% Negative net worth = an insolvent position. The club had been taken to that position by the previous board. What were they going to do to reverse this trend? Post Ashley the 2008 accounts showed a smaller loss than 2007, so there was a slight "recovery". I don't know what 2009 will show, I'm guessing a loss of about £10 million. And then there was relegation.......

What will he do, just write himself a cheque when he fancies the money back? Considering the famous club insider (who everybody is now taking his word as gospel) said when mentioning the 20m that it was an interest free loan. Loan implies he'll be getting it back one way or another. You do realise that the total value of the loans Ashley has made is not just £20 million, but now stands at more than £140 million? He's shipped close to £300 million if you include what he paid for the club in the first place. How is he going to get that back?

Nolan and taylor weren't really the answer to our troubles, having sold Given and Nzogbia to turn a profit we really could have done with a bit of pace to secure the 1 point extra needed to survive. It's funny because he arrived and spent massively when we should have been cutting back, then in the window before relegation he changed his policy to spend nothing when a little investment would have been massively cost effective long term. I get the impression that his refusal to spend now only coincidentally matches up with being the right thing to do at this time. When we reach a window where real investment is needed again, I'm certain he'll get it wrong again. Also, I don't think Shepherd actually invested in '92 did he?, I thought it was all bank loans that he and the Halls were liable for if it went tits up. Not sure about that. We didn't really spend massively in the transfer market in summer 2007, although there was a hike in wages. We may have had a net transfer spend of between £5 million and £10 million (after selling Parker, Dyer) but at that stage, having done no due diligence, I don't think Ashley had the first idea of the economics of the business he'd just bought and he simply went where Fat Sam led him. Transfer dealings were put on hold for months until Mort completed a strategic review of the club which seemed to take ages. Did a wage and transfer fee budget not come out of that? Saying Ashley ignored that and "simply went where Fat Sam led him" is very generously absolving him of blame for increasing the wage bill and making the club less financially viable. Ashley effectively owned the club when he got hold of Shepherd's shares in June 2007 and Mort didn't take over as Chairman until the end of July. If transfer dealings were put on hold "for months" how did we manage to sell Parker, Dyer, Luque and sign Barton, Rozehnal, Smith, Enrique, Beye, Faye, Cacapa and Viduka before the end of August? Mort's strategic review was implemented in January 2008 when Wise and Jimenez were appointed together with the requirement for a "puppet" manager. Ashley unquestionably led to the wage bill being increased and I'm not absolving him of any blame for it. I've quite clearly said he didn't know what he was buying because he didn't do any due diligence - which was quite staggeringly stupid.

Nolan and taylor weren't really the answer to our troubles, having sold Given and Nzogbia to turn a profit we really could have done with a bit of pace to secure the 1 point extra needed to survive. It's funny because he arrived and spent massively when we should have been cutting back, then in the window before relegation he changed his policy to spend nothing when a little investment would have been massively cost effective long term. I get the impression that his refusal to spend now only coincidentally matches up with being the right thing to do at this time. When we reach a window where real investment is needed again, I'm certain he'll get it wrong again. Also, I don't think Shepherd actually invested in '92 did he?, I thought it was all bank loans that he and the Halls were liable for if it went tits up. Not sure about that. We didn't really spend massively in the transfer market in summer 2007, although there was a hike in wages. We may have had a net transfer spend of between £5 million and £10 million (after selling Parker, Dyer) but at that stage, having done no due diligence, I don't think Ashley had the first idea of the economics of the business he'd just bought and he simply went where Fat Sam led him.

Nope. Fred wasn't an idiot. The facts on that beg to differ! Whatever criticism you have of Fred (and plenty is justified), no way was he an idiot. He helped make a massive success of a club about to drop into the third tier. [/NE5] FYP. There seems to be a lot of anti-Shepherd/pro-Ashley people and a few pro-Shepherd/anti-Ashley people and it's always a case of comparing one to the other. We need consensus agreement that they've both done some good and some bad, but overall they're a set of c***s. There are quite a few people who have been saying just that for some time tbh.

Of course he wouldn't. Mind you some still think we wouldn't have needed any more money injected if the old board had still been here. The comments from Llambias aren't surprising really, I wouldn't expect him to come out and say that the current regime's mismanagement led to relegation. And as I've said before on here when they've talked about money going in it's been the truth. Other than that the stuff he says about Ashley needing to back the club financially for it to be able to survive is true. Just purely on the numbers two things occur to me about this: - Ashley's investment in the club must be getting close to £300 million now. - The reason for the 2009 accounts not being filed yet is that Ashley must want these recent cash injections disclosed. Although the accounts will only cover the period to 30th June 2009, anything material that happens before the accounts are signed (and filed) must be disclosed. It could also be that the auditors have required him to put then funding in before signing off the accounts as a going concern. It could well be. A written undertaking from the owner will normally do the trick. But if our net worth has plummeted to more than £50 million negative they may want to see the colour of his money.

Of course he wouldn't. Mind you some still think we wouldn't have needed any more money injected if the old board had still been here. The comments from Llambias aren't surprising really, I wouldn't expect him to come out and say that the current regime's mismanagement led to relegation. And as I've said before on here when they've talked about money going in it's been the truth. Other than that the stuff he says about Ashley needing to back the club financially for it to be able to survive is true. Just purely on the numbers two things occur to me about this: - Ashley's investment in the club must be getting close to £300 million now. - The reason for the 2009 accounts not being filed yet is that Ashley must want these recent cash injections disclosed. Although the accounts will only cover the period to 30th June 2009, anything material that happens before the accounts are signed (and filed) must be disclosed.

I've met Souness twice and on both occasions he was extremely courteous, he is a decent guy imo, not what I'd expected at all.

many would argue we weren't ran particularly well then but the gambles paid off for a while. They could argue that, but financially they'd be wrong, up to the point of Souness appointment. Shepherd's running of the club up to the Souness appointment was certainly commercially and financially was excellent. It may not have been a popular move with the fans, but we hardly spent a penny from 1999 to 2001 on players, he was vilified for it, but he got the club on an even footing with a genuine spring board to bring the likes of Bellamy in, and more importantly afford to bring them in. commercially and financially excellent ? .........share dividends above the going rate,executive payscales above the going rate,warehouse rentals above the going rate. they done well in building the turnover, their use of it left a bit to be desired. That's all you needed to say. Financially we were unbelievably stable in 2004, and you have to bare in mind he'd been chairman for 6 years at that point. Of the biggest clubs in Europe we had the lowest wages/turnover ratio. We were operating at 44% which was also the lowest in the Premiership, from that point onwards obviously it was down hill. I'm not here to support FFS, but he knew how to make Newcastle in to a profitable business, and demonstrated infinitely more business nous to that point than this regime has. I don't see how it can even be argued with. I wouldn't have thought that anyone who is taking a balanced view would argue that the previous board did a fantastic job for a number of years. To achieve continuous Premiership status from where the club was when they took it on was a great achievement let alone playing European football. The stadium development too was a great decision. They looked after themselves pretty well and took a lot more money out than they ever put in, but the achievements are hard to dispute. However ultimately it went badly wrong and the club was in a dreadful state when it was sold, although some will try and say different. By an astonishing stroke of luck SJH managed to find a buyer who was prepared to move quickly and didn't do his due diligence until after he'd bought it, which is unusual to say the least. The Halls and the Shepherds walked off into the sunset with their pockets well lined, a great business transaction for them and an utterly shambolic one for Ashley. But from my perspective it's rather like Sir Fred Goodwin at RBS you get ultimately judged on what you leave behind not the years of record growth, record profits, record dividends etc. The previous board left an insolvent business out of which they (and their families) had taken a great deal of money over the years and that's my ultimate judgement on them.

I think that there would be a different tax treatment depending on whether Ashley's hit was shown as being on the club sale or on the loan. Assuming the deal value was £80 million all in, then Ashley's loss would be, lets say, £164 million (it might actually be more than that depending on if he stuck more funds in during 2009). If he took the hit on the club value then he has a capital loss of £134 million and a trading loss of £30 million. If he took the hit on the loan value then he has a capital loss of £54 million and a trading loss of £110 million. The transaction would be structured around his tax requirements, as you say. Happy Face raised the question of why Ashley hasn't converted the loan into equity. If he did that then the whole of his loss would be a capital loss and I can only guess that he has tax reasons for not wanting to do that. Alternatively he may just be waiting until we achieve the hoped for Premiership status so that he can have a look at the whole debt/equity thing again based on a potentially higher valuation.

No reason to disbelieve that, apart from anything else it tallies with what Caulkin was saying, and he seems to be one of the more ITK journalists. It would mean that Ashley was prepared to take a hit of about £160 million to get rid.

Of course Villa will be losing money per week, almost all clubs do due to how cash flow works at Football clubs. The big difference between us and Villa financially is that they'll have £50m of Premier League money due to them at the end of the season. And they've got a net spend of £50m to go along with it. We've got a net transfer profit of about £40m in the same period. and transfer profit has to be spent exclusivly on transfers ? not to mention how much we still had to pay from when we signed some of those players. Not at all. I think we're wise to tighten our belts and watch that bottom line. Just pointing out there seems to be a £90million difference in the wheeling and dealing at Villa and the toon over the last 2 years. I'm sure i probably haven't understood the complicated accountancy though. How much cash in total has Lerner invested in Aston Villa? No idea but he is making a few bob on the interest he is charging on his loans. "Randy Lerner, who has lent the club £49.5m. These loans are repayable in full in December 2016. Villa paid £4.1m in interest in the year on Lerner's loan, on top of £1.37m to service the bank loan" I've just had a look at Villa's finances, which are 2008 like our latest filed accounts. As at November 2008 Lerner had paid £66 million for the club and invested a further £162 million in a mix of equity and loan. So that's a total of £228 million. Whereas Ashley's investment had cost him £244 million up to October 2008. The fundamental difference of course is that Lerner has been able to stick a large amount of his cash into buying players whereas virtually all of Ashley's money went on funding debts, trading losses and stopping it going bust. And, unlike Ashley, Lerner did not pay over the odds for an insolvent club.

Of course Villa will be losing money per week, almost all clubs do due to how cash flow works at Football clubs. The big difference between us and Villa financially is that they'll have £50m of Premier League money due to them at the end of the season. And they've got a net spend of £50m to go along with it. We've got a net transfer profit of about £40m in the same period. and transfer profit has to be spent exclusivly on transfers ? not to mention how much we still had to pay from when we signed some of those players. Not at all. I think we're wise to tighten our belts and watch that bottom line. Just pointing out there seems to be a £90million difference in the wheeling and dealing at Villa and the toon over the last 2 years. I'm sure i probably haven't understood the complicated accountancy though. How much cash in total has Lerner invested in Aston Villa?

Wenger's more of a compulsive whinger, Benitez is just plain petty. The best thing with Benitez is when he tries to play mind games with other managers, and gets it totally, totally wrong and ends up looking a tit. True but there again he looks a tit a lot of the time these days. His post match interviews laced with his version of "sarcasm" are just pathetic.

Mike Ashley signed the contracts of EVERY player at the club so it's totally his fault. Would be interesting to find out how he would have been treated if he'd shipped out four or five more of our best players to reduce the losses to £10m a season. I suspect the headlines would be 'NUFC losing £250k a week!!!' and also 'Mike Ashley asset stripping c***'. Something along those lines. The headlines should just be "Ashley spouts more bollocks". The papers should report our profit and loss when the accounts are released and only then. Thecertainly shouldn't run a headline about us losing half a million every week as a statement of fact, when the source is the same people to have admitted in court that misleading fans and the media is what they do. On the other hand, as quayside has already pointed out upthread, whenever they have made a statement about the finances, it has proved, on later examination of the accounts, to be true. Really? Back in 2008 they were contradicting themselves all over the shop. "This club had £100million-worth of debt which has now been cleared" "I then poured another £110 million into the club not to pay off the debt but just to reduce it. The club is still in debt. Even worse than that, the club still owes millions of pounds in transfer fees." "Financially we're very sound. We don't owe a bean as far as the club are concerned" Then the accounts showed United’s debt was £22.6m. Selective choice of quotes there, to make it sound like Ashley claimed he had loaned £210m when he never said any such thing. The facts were that he did stick in £100 million and Llambias said that a further £10 million had been stuck in post June 2008, which should show up in the 2009 accounts, making £110 in total. And the club didn't owe a bean to anyone external at that stage. And the accounts did not show a debt of £22.6m, where did you get that from Note 14 in the 2008 accounts says the " loan of £100 million from Mr MJW Ashley is unsecured. The loan agreement is that interest can be charged at a rate of LIBOR + 0.5%, however no interest has been charged in the year to 30 June 2008." I never intended that to come across as " he said £210m". The first quote said £100m had cleared all the debt. The second unrelated quote said £110m hadn't been enough to clear the debt. Two contradicting stories that show, on finances, like everything else, they make it up as they go along. The £22.6m figure came from this report on the accounts... http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2009/01/23/newcastle-united-club-accounts-reveal-state-of-play-61634-22758691/ So it hasn't occurred to you that a business making losses needs funding as it goes along. The £100 million did clear the external debt at that time but as the club lost more money further funds were needed to bale it out. And the article quite clearly states that the figure of £22.6m is the net current liabilities. Ashley's loan does not form part of that figure because he was not going to call it in within a period of 12 months. I fully understand that not everyone understands this stuff but drawing sweeping conclusions based on minimal knowledge is a shyte idea tbh. I appreciate that and I'm grateful to people like you who point out mistakes of a lay person like me. But wouldn't you agree the claim that we were debt free in May 2008 was a season ticket pushing distortion of the facts at best, just on the basis of the outstanding transfer liabilities they knew existed and later used as evidence of crushing debt? Again it's a case of derfinitions. Generally when you talk about a company's debt you are referring to its major external long term funding. The day to day liabilities that are incurred on running the business aren't included. Everyone knew Ashley paid off the external debt, it was in the 2007 accounts and widely reported in the press. He had to pay most of it off because there was a change of ownership clause in the loan agreements and not having done any due diligence he was unaware of this when he bought the club. The statement you refer to is clearly aimed at making the point that the club was not in the hands of external lenders who could foreclose. And if it's true (as is widely rumoured) that he was prepared to sell the club and write that debt off then the statement has even wider implications. Well I don't buy that either. The way I see it he's talking to papers sold to non-accountants like me. When he says... "The debt has now been cleared" it translates to "Go and buy season tickets, it'll all get spent on players" and then 4 months later when he says he didn't really..... "pay off the debt, just reduced it." it translates to "I can't afford to buy any players, I've saved the club" The cycle of promises and execuses repeats consistently around transfer window time. In December he was all about putting in a bit of money having stabilised the club, supporting Hughton and ensuring promotion, but now he's losing £2m every month and we're the next Portsmouth. I think that you have a tendency to reach dramatic conclusions from very little. I won’t deny that Ashley puts a spin on the finances but when he says he’s put money in the evidence to date is that it’s the truth. And I know full well what his track record is like when it comes to what he’s said on other matters. I really can’t get my head round your last sentence. As I see it he tried to do all of those things - and surely the very point is that we aren’t the next Portsmouth, because unlike them we don’t have an owner who has walked away.

Mike Ashley signed the contracts of EVERY player at the club so it's totally his fault. Would be interesting to find out how he would have been treated if he'd shipped out four or five more of our best players to reduce the losses to £10m a season. I suspect the headlines would be 'NUFC losing £250k a week!!!' and also 'Mike Ashley asset stripping c***'. Something along those lines. The headlines should just be "Ashley spouts more bollocks". The papers should report our profit and loss when the accounts are released and only then. Thecertainly shouldn't run a headline about us losing half a million every week as a statement of fact, when the source is the same people to have admitted in court that misleading fans and the media is what they do. On the other hand, as quayside has already pointed out upthread, whenever they have made a statement about the finances, it has proved, on later examination of the accounts, to be true. Really? Back in 2008 they were contradicting themselves all over the shop. "This club had £100million-worth of debt which has now been cleared" "I then poured another £110 million into the club not to pay off the debt but just to reduce it. The club is still in debt. Even worse than that, the club still owes millions of pounds in transfer fees." "Financially we're very sound. We don't owe a bean as far as the club are concerned" Then the accounts showed Uniteds debt was £22.6m. Selective choice of quotes there, to make it sound like Ashley claimed he had loaned £210m when he never said any such thing. The facts were that he did stick in £100 million and Llambias said that a further £10 million had been stuck in post June 2008, which should show up in the 2009 accounts, making £110 in total. And the club didn't owe a bean to anyone external at that stage. And the accounts did not show a debt of £22.6m, where did you get that from Note 14 in the 2008 accounts says the " loan of £100 million from Mr MJW Ashley is unsecured. The loan agreement is that interest can be charged at a rate of LIBOR + 0.5%, however no interest has been charged in the year to 30 June 2008." I never intended that to come across as " he said £210m". The first quote said £100m had cleared all the debt. The second unrelated quote said £110m hadn't been enough to clear the debt. Two contradicting stories that show, on finances, like everything else, they make it up as they go along. The £22.6m figure came from this report on the accounts... http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2009/01/23/newcastle-united-club-accounts-reveal-state-of-play-61634-22758691/ So it hasn't occurred to you that a business making losses needs funding as it goes along. The £100 million did clear the external debt at that time but as the club lost more money further funds were needed to bale it out. And the article quite clearly states that the figure of £22.6m is the net current liabilities. Ashley's loan does not form part of that figure because he was not going to call it in within a period of 12 months. I fully understand that not everyone understands this stuff but drawing sweeping conclusions based on minimal knowledge is a shyte idea tbh. I appreciate that and I'm grateful to people like you who point out mistakes of a lay person like me. But wouldn't you agree the claim that we were debt free in May 2008 was a season ticket pushing distortion of the facts at best, just on the basis of the outstanding transfer liabilities they knew existed and later used as evidence of crushing debt? Again it's a case of derfinitions. Generally when you talk about a company's debt you are referring to its major external long term funding. The day to day liabilities that are incurred on running the business aren't included. Everyone knew Ashley paid off the external debt, it was in the 2007 accounts and widely reported in the press. He had to pay most of it off because there was a change of ownership clause in the loan agreements and not having done any due diligence he was unaware of this when he bought the club. The statement you refer to is clearly aimed at making the point that the club was not in the hands of external lenders who could foreclose. And if it's true (as is widely rumoured) that he was prepared to sell the club and write that debt off then the statement has even wider implications.

Mike Ashley signed the contracts of EVERY player at the club so it's totally his fault. Would be interesting to find out how he would have been treated if he'd shipped out four or five more of our best players to reduce the losses to £10m a season. I suspect the headlines would be 'NUFC losing £250k a week!!!' and also 'Mike Ashley asset stripping c***'. Something along those lines. The headlines should just be "Ashley spouts more bollocks". The papers should report our profit and loss when the accounts are released and only then. Thecertainly shouldn't run a headline about us losing half a million every week as a statement of fact, when the source is the same people to have admitted in court that misleading fans and the media is what they do. On the other hand, as quayside has already pointed out upthread, whenever they have made a statement about the finances, it has proved, on later examination of the accounts, to be true. Really? Back in 2008 they were contradicting themselves all over the shop. "This club had £100million-worth of debt which has now been cleared" "I then poured another £110 million into the club not to pay off the debt but just to reduce it. The club is still in debt. Even worse than that, the club still owes millions of pounds in transfer fees." "Financially we're very sound. We don't owe a bean as far as the club are concerned" Then the accounts showed Uniteds debt was £22.6m. Selective choice of quotes there, to make it sound like Ashley claimed he had loaned £210m when he never said any such thing. The facts were that he did stick in £100 million and Llambias said that a further £10 million had been stuck in post June 2008, which should show up in the 2009 accounts, making £110 in total. And the club didn't owe a bean to anyone external at that stage. And the accounts did not show a debt of £22.6m, where did you get that from Note 14 in the 2008 accounts says the " loan of £100 million from Mr MJW Ashley is unsecured. The loan agreement is that interest can be charged at a rate of LIBOR + 0.5%, however no interest has been charged in the year to 30 June 2008." I never intended that to come across as " he said £210m". The first quote said £100m had cleared all the debt. The second unrelated quote said £110m hadn't been enough to clear the debt. Two contradicting stories that show, on finances, like everything else, they make it up as they go along. The £22.6m figure came from this report on the accounts... http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2009/01/23/newcastle-united-club-accounts-reveal-state-of-play-61634-22758691/ So it hasn't occurred to you that a business making losses needs funding as it goes along. The £100 million did clear the external debt at that time but as the club lost more money further funds were needed to bale it out. And the article quite clearly states that the figure of £22.6m is the net current liabilities. Ashley's loan does not form part of that figure because he was not going to call it in within a period of 12 months. I fully understand that not everyone understands this stuff but drawing sweeping conclusions based on minimal knowledge is a shyte idea tbh.

It really is. And one of the largest audit firms in the world is actively working with Ashley so that the accounts fully support his PR propaganda......

Mike Ashley signed the contracts of EVERY player at the club so it's totally his fault. Would be interesting to find out how he would have been treated if he'd shipped out four or five more of our best players to reduce the losses to £10m a season. I suspect the headlines would be 'NUFC losing £250k a week!!!' and also 'Mike Ashley asset stripping c***'. Something along those lines. The headlines should just be "Ashley spouts more bollocks". The papers should report our profit and loss when the accounts are released and only then. Thecertainly shouldn't run a headline about us losing half a million every week as a statement of fact, when the source is the same people to have admitted in court that misleading fans and the media is what they do. On the other hand, as quayside has already pointed out upthread, whenever they have made a statement about the finances, it has proved, on later examination of the accounts, to be true. Really? Back in 2008 they were contradicting themselves all over the shop. "This club had £100million-worth of debt which has now been cleared" "I then poured another £110 million into the club not to pay off the debt but just to reduce it. The club is still in debt. Even worse than that, the club still owes millions of pounds in transfer fees." "Financially we're very sound. We don't owe a bean as far as the club are concerned" Then the accounts showed United’s debt was £22.6m. Selective choice of quotes there, to make it sound like Ashley claimed he had loaned £210m when he never said any such thing. The facts were that he did stick in £100 million and Llambias said that a further £10 million had been stuck in post June 2008, which should show up in the 2009 accounts, making £110 in total. And the club didn't owe a bean to anyone external at that stage. And the accounts did not show a debt of £22.6m, where did you get that from Note 14 in the 2008 accounts says the " loan of £100 million from Mr MJW Ashley is unsecured. The loan agreement is that interest can be charged at a rate of LIBOR + 0.5%, however no interest has been charged in the year to 30 June 2008."

Been here before with UV my post 99 on the attached was on this same topic. http://www.newcastle-online.org/nufcforum/index.php/topic,62694.90.html an intelligent poster but has a major blind spot on the legacy of the previous board. Or he knows he's talking shyte and is in denial. I don't want to go into what he says about Ashley because firstly some of what Ashley has done is truly indefensible and secondly Ashley will ultimately be judged on what he leaves behind, like any owner. As far as the crap about the previous board is concerned - at the end of their ownership like f*ck we were self sufficient, in June 2007: - We had racked up trading losses of £90 million - We were technically insolvent - We had borrowed against every asset (and twice against the training ground) - All our debt was owed externally and the owners were not in the habit of putting money in - Ashley had to personally guarantee that he would financially support the club to convince the auditors it was a going concern And of course SJH only baled out because he felt it was time for some fresh blood to take over