McGinlay, Kevin Davies and Bergsson urge Eddie Davies to act swiftly to stave off administration

Maybe I should leave you for a few days to think all this through, Sluffy. I have explained, on more than one occasion, what was wrong with the Administrators Statement and why it was impossible for it to be correct.

I know that you are quite good at researching and turning stuff up. Might I suggest that you check out WW on the matter of who leaked the 'done deal' before it was a done deal. I think you might find the answer to that conundrum there.

Sharon is on record as saying that Eddie Davies was a wonderful man, or words to that effect. I also think that from what I know. I'm expecting that on Saturday, Sharon or the club, will take the opportunity to pay some respects to Eddie's widow who died in January.

P.S. Try starting around Page 888 of the Take Over thread on WW.

P.P.S. I see that on Page 896 you yourself were (rightly imo) questioning the professional ethics involved. I quote:

"It certainly was something you would never expect any professional involved in confidential sale (let alone the Administrator) to give permission to a friend/colleague to spread the word that a deal is finalised all but and that he could quote his source as that from the top man himself!!! "

Ok I'll play.

The Tweeter who posted the deal has since deleted his account...

https://twitter.com/JME19742

...apparently it was James Mark Elliot from Cowgills...

https://www.cowgills.co.uk/our-people/#jason-elliott

...Cowgills were (and still are) the clubs auditors (so worked closely with EDT who put us in to Administration.

The Administrators were Begbies Traynor and the main Administrator was Paul Appleton.

In his deleted tweets Elliot claimed Appleton gave permission to tweet what he did.

It seems that at the time of his tweets that Nixon was also Tweeting the deal had NOT been done...



The quote you posted of me was from page 909 not 896.

I found this on page 920...

I suspect Ken owes EDT  c.7.5m (nearly 8m according to Howard) and he was obliged to appoint Quantuma as hotel administrators to protect his position against EDT.


I'm not sure what this circa £7.5m came from/what is was for - I guess I'd always assumed it was wrapped up in someway in paying off the BluMarble loan, so I tracked back to see if I could confirm that and found this...

If it were the case that KA had taken £550K (or the £525K mentioned in the BL accounts) for his own use in 2017 when, despite ED writing off  £198m, Burnden Leisure still had creditors due in one year of £38m, every ounce of newspaper bile would be more than justified. But is that what really happened?

KA remained dependent on ED support until ED's last living breath in September 2018 and its hard to see how the club would get through to Christmas 2017 without ED coming up with  substantial cash support between June and December 2017. So would ED have countenanced such a payment to KA? Most unlikely imo but in any case we know from the Inner Circle accounts that KA had to find £472K to gain control from Holdsworth and prevent foreclosure by Blumarble, without which ED's hopes or ambitions of a solvent sale would have been crushed


and also this from another post...

I cannot see that ED would have had a problem with Anderson making a profit if it achieved the desired outcome but KA walking off with £525k before it had happened was a different ball game altogether. I cannot see ED standing for that then still advancing more money.



The point being that in respect of the circa £7.5m, it is strongly being implied that Eddie gave or 'loaned' KA that amount to keep BWFC going and not fall into Admin sooner.

So if that was the case it would explain no increase in creditors outstanding from the previous years accounts prior to Admin and also mean that the BluMarble loan was a separate issue.

So did Eddie expect KA to repay him the circa £7.5m at some point - we don't know but it would appear that EDT probably did and and if so why KA appointed an Administrator for the hotel to best protect his position.

I'm still somewhat confused though.

How did Eddie give KA this £7.5m and where from and how where was it recorded?

Similarly how did KA spend this money and again how was it recorded?

The Administrator seems to have knocked off a similar sum to both EDT and KA's secured creditors amounts - so I guess that is where he thought it had come from in respect of EDT and presumably believed the money went into revenue expenditure directly(?) and not as a personal secured loan into BWFC from KA first(?) thus ruling out circa £7.5m from his secured creditor claim also?

It seems to me that the Administrator considered that the 'loan', 'gift' or whatever the money may be termed was seen by him as Eddie reducing by circa £7.5m his secured assets and the money going directly on BWFC's revenue expenditure - and thus not as an amount that KA was obligated to pay back to Eddie/EDT(?).

To my mind everything depends on the paper trail of where the money came from and where it went - I mean were their signed contracts, Letter of Authority, Instructions to accountants, the bank, the taxman etc, etc, etc.

Were contracts established and if so what terms were agreed?

This would establish the legality (or not) of the action the Administrator did by reducing EDT and KA's Secured Creditor amounts claimed.


That is at least where I've got up to so far and without further guidance I don't really think I can go much further on.

I've still have no idea why Elliot from Cowgill's tweeted what he did, when he did - and why his information turned out to be wrong.

I guess he must have believed KA Administrator had already agreed to it???

Highly unprofessional of him in any event and I stand by the post I made at the time.

Did you not notice this, Sluffy?

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=sharon+brittan+cowgills#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:16bf8825,vid:2FlJSDo7K_A

Ten Bobsworth wrote:Did you not notice this, Sluffy?

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=sharon+brittan+cowgills#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:16bf8825,vid:2FlJSDo7K_A

I certainly remember the video 'love-in' between the two of them!

One thought I had since my 'research' on the thread on ww, is this...

You've told me (I've not doubled checked) that there was no increase in creditors from the last accounts before Administration and the Auditors report - yes?

We seem to be going down the path that Eddie funded the club in someway or other to circa £7.5m (after the club had been sold to Anderson) and we think the Administrator somehow believes that was funded from Eddie's secured creditor status - and that's why the Administrator stated an amount circa £7.5m less than EDT believed to still remain as its secured creditor amount - have I got that right?

If I have then why has the creditor outstanding total remained the same?

Would it not have reduced by circa £7.5m because Eddie's secured creditor status has by that amount?

Ok, I guess you could have had circa £7.5m of new creditors, that would have put the total back to what it was - but that sounds too coincidental to me - and I often find that coincidences are more often not coincidences at all but done deliberately.

I'm guessing the same would not have happened applied to KA if the Administrator deemed he never had that amount of secured credit in the first place?

I would have thought Eddie's secured creditor status would had been on the books for several years, and recorded as such in previous audited accounts under - outstanding creditors due for payment after one year or more?

So if it has and the Administrator somehow believes it has been used to pay the bills - then why hasn't the outstanding creditor total reduced by the same amount as well?

Am I missing something?

You are getting warmer, Sluffy, but I have explained all this before.

There was never any intention that KA would take over the reigns and fund the club himself. He wasn't that stupid. In fact he wasn't stupid at all and knew his way round insolvency law and practice better than most.

According to Rubens, KA says that he was owed £7.5m. That was entirely credible and almost certainly true comprising money lent to him by Eddie that he spent in keeping the show on the road and, just before Eddie died, repaying Blumarble. The £7.5m owed to him by the club was, in turn, owed by him to the Eddie Davies Trust and he had taken steps to secure it against the club assets.

Rubens claim that he was owed and secured for less than £1.6m was frankly incredulous but would have left KA high and dry if somehow it had been allowed to go through. Neither KA nor his lawyers would ever have countenanced that.

If you were to substitute £7.5m for £1.6m in Appendix 5, the total creditor figures would start to make some sense with other known facts. Without doing that, they don't.

Sluffy wrote:

I certainly remember the video 'love-in' between the two of them!

I found it a bit cringeworthy too but that's not the main point, is it?

It's not why I thought you might want to take another look.

Ten Bobsworth wrote:You are getting warmer, Sluffy, but I have explained all this before.

There was never any intention that KA would take over the reigns and fund the club himself. He wasn't that stupid. In fact he wasn't stupid at all and knew his way round insolvency law and practice better than most.

According to Rubens, KA says that he was owed £7.5m. That was entirely credible and almost certainly true comprising money lent to him by Eddie that he spent in keeping the show on the road and, just before Eddie died, repaying Blumarble. The £7.5m owed to him by the club was, in turn, owed by him to the Eddie Davies Trust and he had taken steps to secure it against the club assets.

Rubens claim that he was owed and secured for less than £1.6m was frankly incredulous but would have left KA high and dry if somehow it had been allowed to go through. Neither KA nor his lawyers would ever have countenanced that.

If you were to substitute £7.5m for £1.6m in Appendix 5, the total creditor figures would start to make some sense with other known facts. Without doing that, they don't.

I still really haven't got it Bob.

What I think I understand is this -

As far as I can tell the BluMarble settlement was for something like £4.8m - being £4m capital and £800k interest (I think BM went after Holdsworth for the 'missing' £1m capital and wrote off much of the interest (over £2m?) that had accrued under the terms of the loan Holdsworth had signed up to).

Again, as far as I can tell Eddie loaned KA £5m to settle the BM loan and KA was personally responsible to pay it back (secured against the ownership of BWFC).

There were also whispers that Eddie helped pay the players wages from time to time during Anderson's ownership.

So maybe Eddie put in £7.5m of which £5m is known to be contractual (the loan to pay off BM secured against Inner Circle) and £2.5m we are (or at least I am) unsure if or how it was secured.

We also know the KA put the £5m into the club secured against assets (which I had understood were ALL already previously secured against - I still don't understand how that works?) and settled the BM loan in full.

Now this is one of the things I don't understand - KA had only one charge against Burnden Leisure (now BWFC2019) which was registered on 27th Sept, 2018

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/00043026/charges

...so how did he end up believing he had £7.5m secured?

He had either had to top up the £5m loan from Eddie from his own money, or Eddie gave him £7.5m at the time, or he had the £2.5m Eddie had loaned him for the wages, etc, in 2017 (as per the informed comments from the poster CC on ww) sitting in his bank somewhere?

Moving on.

I still don't understand why there was a split Administration, why didn't EDT simply include the hotel as well?

Didn't their floating charge cover everything?

And even if it didn't why didn't PBP who certainly did have a charge over the hotel, step in with appointing their Administrator (who presumably could be the same one as EDT had, or at least from the same company?)

Also I don't really understand how Eddie expect KA to pay the BM loan money back - the club was clearly insolvent and went into Admin in May 2019?

Even if he had lived he would have either had to continue putting his hand in his pocket or pull the plug for good - but clearly KA couldn't turn the club around and thus pay off Eddies loan.

I can't understand either why KA took the loan on as a personal debt against himself because he too would know the club was not going to earn back the money in any time soon for him to pay Eddie?

I can understand Eddie taking the path he did to ensure the money went to paying off BM but did he really expect it to be repaid, did he really want to own the club again on default?

I would not have thought so?

As far as I recall EDT ended up waiving the loan to KA in the end anyway and KA waived the £1.6m shown to be owed to him as a secured creditor.

I have no idea why Elliot from Cowgill's tweeted what he did (and I did note from the video that Sharon states that he was extremely helpful both pre, during and post the Administration - almost as though she is somehow in his debt?).

I also have no idea why Appleton knocked circa £7.5m from both EDT and KA's claims for secured loans.

As I've said above, I don't understand how KA believed he even had £7.5m secured (unless Eddie gave him the £7.5m the day or two before he died) and I certainly don't understand how you can secure a loan on an assets that have already been secured against???

Ok I could see that if an asset grew in value more than loans secured against it already that would allow additional loans to be secured against it - but even then those with pre-existing floating charges would still be the first in line for settlement anyway I would imagine?

I've no idea why the Administrator deemed EDT secured asset claim was overstated by £7.5m - unless Eddie had previously received a similar payment from BL to part settle his loan?

The deficiency as shown on the Administrators report was £11.5m.

If you add on to that the £7.5m KA claimed it would increase to £19m - less the £1.6m shown to him as a secured creditor.

But if we are doing this should we also not add back the £7.5m taken off EDT secured creditor amount - and if so that would return us to the original £11.5m total?

As I said at the outset, I still don't really understand what had gone on here, or for why really?

It seems to me that Eddie continued to prop the club up, that maybe he became somewhat mistrustful of KA and formalised his later loans to ensure they ended up in the club causing KA to cover his back in not to become liable for them.

Maybe EDT did not know, or understand this, or maybe it wasn't true and Eddie did want his BM loan paying back - but then the question is why did KA agree to that knowing the club would never be in a position to be able to pay him back in time to settle with Eddie?

I also don't understand what you see as the consequences and the relevance of all this over three years later?

I understand there is something here that is important to you - but I don't seem to be able to understand what it is?

I like to strip away the veneer and get close to the truth if I can, Sluffy. It might not be everyone's bag but hey ho!

I am afraid that your touching belief that everything administrators might do must be pukka, proper and professional seems to have been a rather shaky facade in this case but I'd still be interested to know what they hoped or expected to achieve by their methods

So what did the individuals that comprise FV hope to get out of it? I expect Michael James hoped to help save the club and get some of PBP's money back, Nick Mason might have hoped to make a few quid on his investment and Sharon wants to do good, at least that's what she says she wants.

What did Ken Anderson want? Make a few quid on his investment I expect. I also think, like Sharon, he fancied the challenge. He made a decent start by recruiting an experienced CEO and capable manager. FV seemed to start by doing the opposite even if Mr Hill did know his onions.

KA, of course, ran out of financial support. FV haven't but I would question whether they would be able to finance a sustainable Championship club if that's where we happen to be this time next year.

Thanks Bob.

I may indeed have a touching belief that the Administrator might do a pukka, proper and professional job mainly because I've no reason to think otherwise but also that they are professionally regulated via a Government Agency - The Insolvency Service

https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/insolvency-service/about

Clearly there has been some issue here between what EDT believed they had secured (17m) and what the Administrator ruled they had (£10.05m).

If EDT were really not happy about that they could have made an official complaint to the Insolvency Agency...

https://www.insolvencydirect.bis.gov.uk/ExternalOnlineForms/InsolvencyPractitionerComplaint.aspx

And if they really believed the Administrator had made a £7m error against them, you would think they might well have done - or at least I would.


I also believe accountants do a pukka, proper and professional job too but there are always a few who don't live up to expectations either.

I don't doubt EDT had reasons to believe they were right by stating £17m but the Administrator had some good cause to question that.

Was the cause strong enough to prove conclusively if they had to fight a case of professional negligence against their governing body and the governments Insolvency Service, -  well it appears for now that EDT have not brought a claim against them, neither has KA (although I never understood how (A) he had £7.5m in the first place to secure (he only made the one 'charge' against assets - when seemingly he only had the £5m from Eddie to pay off BluMarble) and (B) how the system works when apparently ALL the assets he could secure against already had previous charges against them?).

I've listed in my post above a whole series of questions and queries as to why I am unclear and uncertain as to what went on.

You've chosen not to address them, which of course is your prerogative not to do so - some/many/most may be me simply talking rubbish as I've clearly not understood much if anything that was going on and thus not worth your while to address - but I would like to think that one or two aren't talking rubbish and might even be problematical to answer within your model of what you believed had gone on and why.

Fwiw I consider you a highly pukka, proper and professional person but that doesn't mean I always agree with everything you say, none of us are perfect in everything we do and as the saying goes 'two heads are better than one' when we try to look at these things.

I'm sorry, Sluffy, but you haven't got your head round this.

Blumarble got their money back. How?

If Ken Anderson repaid it, the same amount (thick end of £5million) is then owed to Ken Anderson instead. If Eddie repaid it, the same amount is owed to Eddie instead.  

The administrators have reported it as being owed to nobody. How did they figure that out?

It all happened in September (2018) so I suggest you can rule out Father Christmas and the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy doesn't usually deal in £millions.

Please just stop and think for a minute.

Background

Eddie secured his loan against Inner Circle Investments Ltd.

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/09782053/charges

How did Eddie give the loan money to KA?

Did he even give it to KA?

There is no record of ICI receiving £5m or more, in order to pay to BWFC (or KA directly) to put into BWFC/(Burnden Leisure or BW Football and Athletic Club) - so it doesn't seem to be that way.

KA registered a charge against BWFC although we do not know how much he secured it for - but KA claimed circa £7.5m but the Admin allowed just £1.6m.

IF he had really put in £7.5m and only £1.6m was deemed secured - then I would have thought the remaining £5.9m would be shown as an unsecured loan owed to him?

On the 16th September, 2018 a single share was issued for ICI bringing the share holding up to 2 in total - both held by KA.

Why???

ICI owned virtually all the shares in BL (circa 94.5%).

BL's Confirmation statement with updates 20th Oct, 2018 doesn't seem to show any new shares being issued - but there were updates although I can't work out what they were as there's simply to much detail and it is to small for me to easily read.

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/00335699/filing-history


BluMarble

Their charge was against BL and was satisfied on the 24th Sept, 2018.


Conclusion

There doesn't seem on the surface to be an obvious paper trail as to how the money from Eddie that ended up paying off the BM loan was moved about.

As you say neither Eddie/EDT or KA seemed to have put additional funds into BL to pay off the debt due from BM and no previously unknown third party is shown as a new multi-million pound creditor of BL.

The only way I can think that payment could have happened without showing Eddie or KA shown to be owed anything and the BM debt being paid off is from a switch from a loan to equity in the company.

Maybe there is something in the detail of BL's Confirmation Statement of Oct, 2018 I can't see but there is nothing registered at CH that any new shares had been issued.


Did the Administrator believe Eddie had put £7.5m of his secured loan into equity at BL - and lost it all when the Company fell into Administration the following June?

It seems implausible to me without documentation existing to that effect.

I guess if it did happen KA took the £7.5m, registered a charge on BL then paid off BM.

That I think might then show BM being settled without a loan being owed to ED or KA.  It would explain why £7.5m was taken off EDT's claim (the debt had been rolled into equity) and also KA's claim (that the money used to pay off the £5m BM loan was equity in the company and not a personal loan from him.

However I can't explain why then the Administrator allowed a £1.6m charge to KA?

And more importantly I can't understand how BM got paid or KA supposedly made the £7.5m charge?   What I mean is even if Eddie said 'ok, reduce my loan by £7.5m, call it now equity and go and pay BM off with it - it doesn't magically make £7.5m suddenly appear in BWFC's bank account - does it!

Somebody has to put it there in order that the money can be wired to BM's bank.


To square the circle so to speak...

ED loaned KA £5m to pay off BM.

He had secured it against a personal loan with KA on ICI which owned the shares in BL

ICI issued a second share to KA, which presumably changed hands to ED and thus he became an equal partner in ICI

KA took the £5m loan (plus an additional sum???) and put a charge against BL before settling with BM in full.

If the Administrator believed there was a £7.5m loan to equity swop by ED that would explain where the money came from to pay off BM and not show a loan still outstanding to ED or KA - ED simply lost his money when the shares became worthless when the company fell into Administration

The Administers action of disallowing the £7.5m on EDT and KA's claims for secured charges left KA vulnerable for settlement of the personal loan he took out with ED to pay off the BM loan.

Epilogue

It still leaves me with the raft of questions I asked earlier on, such as why did KA take on the £5m loan personally against himself when he must have known he couldn't pay it back from anything he could make on the club anytime soon, if at all?  And why did EDT simply not appoint the one Administrator for everything? Etc, etc, etc.

And added one or two new questions as well!



I think the answer probably is that the Administrator considered the £7.5m of Eddie's to be loan to equity, however I can't think of a mechanism or follow a paper trail to explain how that could be, or how it appeared in BL's bank account in order to settle the BM loan.

I'm stumped.

Then again could an external third party pay it off.

The contract is between BM and BL.

I guess there is nothing to stop say myself if I had a spare £5m under the mattress, to ring up BM and say would you mind at all if I cleared BL's debt with you today?

Therefore there's nothing to stop Eddie doing so or even KA in a personal capacity - the debt would be settled and there would be nothing on BL accounts showing ED or KA being owed for clearing the loan.

Of course neither would do that and apparently KA raised a charge - so I assume BL bank statement must have shown a receipt of at least £5m from him - in order to send it to BM to settle with them.


I keep coming back to the Administrator ruling Eddie had circa £7.5m less than he stated - how did that sum vanish?

Eddie did not take it out - so it must still be there - and the only way it can still be there and not shown as secured is if it was changed from a loan to equity...

...but where is the paperwork if that was the case - there isn't any.

Nope, still stumped.

For heavens sake, Sluffy, I have had the patience to explain all this to you before but plainly you have had neither your listening ears nor your thinking head on. Please don't ask me to spend any more time on meritless meanderings.

It's plain for anyone with eyes to see that Eddie Davies had resolved that he would be making no more loans to Bolton Wanderers after 2014. However desperate situations require desperate remedies and so in 2016 he appears to have decided that he would, if absolutely necessary, lend Ken Anderson a limited amount of money to keep the show on the road. It would then be Anderson, not the club, that would be personally responsible for repayment if push should ever come to shove.

Anderson had taken on an exceptionally difficult task. Holdsworth's temporary involvement had cost the club a small fortune whilst Anderson had done extremely well to hold off Blumarble as long as he did. He couldn't do it forever, hence Anderson's telephone calls to Eddie whilst Eddie and Sue were on holiday in Portugal in August/September 2018. One can only imagine Sue being livid at the further stress being placed on her and her husband.

Anyway the upshot was that once again Eddie would lend the money to Anderson, not the club, whilst Anderson sought to secure his debt to Eddie against the club. Eddie died just a few days later aged 72. His memorial service at Bolton Parish Church was not attended by either Ken Anderson or Dean Holdsworth. Neither was it attended by Sam Allardyce but that, as they say, is another story.

Sue Davies died in January this year, aged 73. I sincerely hope the club's owners did something in recognition of Sue's death and the massive contribution that the Eddie Davies Trust made to Bolton Wanderers before Eddie's death and, to a lesser extent, after it. At the moment I cannot see where they have.

Thanks Bob.

Maybe I didn't have my listening ears on but I do usually have my thinking head on.

I don't doubt the outline of what happened is correct but that doesn't explain...

Why the Administrator struck off circa £7.5m from EDT and KA's secured creditors claims or why Elliot from Cowgill's leaked that the deal had been done when it had not?

Ten Bobsworth wrote:...can you explain why the administrators were vague about the exact amounts owed to the Eddie Davies Trust and, crucially, significantly misrepresented the amounts owed to Ken Anderson?

At the end of the day it was leaked, you might ask yourself from where, that a deal had been done BEFORE anyone had had the courtesy to check with Anderson's lawyers whether they agreed the terms.

It doesn't explain...

Ten Bobsworth wrote:...how the Blumarble debt seemed to vanish into thin air. Nobody was credited with paying it off and it just disappeared as if by magic!

It doesn't explain your apparent contradiction here...

Ten Bobsworth wrote:There was never any intention that KA would take over the reigns and fund the club himself. He wasn't that stupid. In fact he wasn't stupid at all and knew his way round insolvency law and practice better than most.

So KA wasn't stupid enough to fund the club (which was running on fumes), yet...

Ten Bobsworth wrote:Anderson had taken on an exceptionally difficult task. Holdsworth's temporary involvement had cost the club a small fortune whilst Anderson had done extremely well to hold off Blumarble as long as he did. He couldn't do it forever, hence Anderson's telephone calls to Eddie whilst Eddie and Sue were on holiday in Portugal in August/September 2018. One can only imagine Sue being livid at the further stress being placed on her and her husband.

Anyway the upshot was that once again Eddie would lend the money to Anderson, not the club, whilst Anderson sought to secure his debt to Eddie against the club.

So was he smart enough to keep his money out of an insolvent BWFC then took out a £5m? PERSONAL loan to keep it going as it was plunging headlong towards Administration???

As you yourself states...

Ten Bobsworth wrote:It could never last at BWFC without more money but it was quite an achievement and he did actually hold an AGM where he answered all questions raised by those attending.

You've never explained my raft of questions which include...

Sluffy wrote:I still don't understand why there was a split Administration, why didn't EDT simply include the hotel as well?

Didn't their floating charge cover everything?

And even if it didn't why didn't PBP who certainly did have a charge over the hotel, step in with appointing their Administrator (who presumably could be the same one as EDT had, or at least from the same company?)

Also I don't really understand how Eddie expect KA to pay the BM loan money back - the club was clearly insolvent and went into Admin in May 2019?

Even if he had lived he would have either had to continue putting his hand in his pocket or pull the plug for good - but clearly KA couldn't turn the club around and thus pay off Eddies loan.

I can't understand either why KA took the loan on as a personal debt against himself because he too would know the club was not going to earn back the money in any time soon for him to pay Eddie?

I can understand Eddie taking the path he did to ensure the money went to paying off BM but did he really expect it to be repaid, did he really want to own the club again on default?

I would not have thought so?

As far as I recall EDT ended up waiving the loan to KA in the end anyway and KA waived the £1.6m shown to be owed to him as a secured creditor.

I have no idea why Elliot from Cowgill's tweeted what he did (and I did note from the video that Sharon states that he was extremely helpful both pre, during and post the Administration - almost as though she is somehow in his debt?).

I also have no idea why Appleton knocked circa £7.5m from both EDT and KA's claims for secured loans.

As I've said above, I don't understand how KA believed he even had £7.5m secured (unless Eddie gave him the £7.5m the day or two before he died) and I certainly don't understand how you can secure a loan on an assets that have already been secured against???

Ok I could see that if an asset grew in value more than loans secured against it already that would allow additional loans to be secured against it - but even then those with pre-existing floating charges would still be the first in line for settlement anyway I would imagine?

I've no idea why the Administrator deemed EDT secured asset claim was overstated by £7.5m - unless Eddie had previously received a similar payment from BL to part settle his loan? [edit - or swopped loan to equity]

The deficiency as shown on the Administrators report was £11.5m.

If you add on to that the £7.5m KA claimed it would increase to £19m - less the £1.6m shown to him as a secured creditor.

But if we are doing this should we also not add back the £7.5m taken off EDT secured creditor amount - and if so that would return us to the original £11.5m total?

As I said at the outset, I still don't really understand what had gone on here, or for why really?

It seems to me that Eddie continued to prop the club up, that maybe he became somewhat mistrustful of KA and formalised his later loans to ensure they ended up in the club causing KA to cover his back in not to become liable for them.

Maybe EDT did not know, or understand this, or maybe it wasn't true and Eddie did want his BM loan paying back - but then the question is why did KA agree to that knowing the club would never be in a position to be able to pay him back in time to settle with Eddie?

I also don't understand what you see as the consequences and the relevance of all this over three years later?

I understand there is something here that is important to you - but I don't seem to be able to understand what it is?

I've also stated many times over the last week or so that I'm not an insolvency expert, I'm not even an accountant and my specialism is in the public sector not the private sector so I've no experience what-so-ever on mergers and acquisitions - which all this is actually about!

I am interested in understanding what went on and I'm happy to play your game the best I can but I can't give you correct answers to something I don't know and on issues I have no idea about.

You haven't explained what had happened, I did have my listening hears on as well as my thinking head, you simply sketched an outlined of what you believed happened (and I don't doubt you are on the right track) but you haven't given any detail of how and what took place - why didn't EDT appoint one Administrator for everything including the hotel, how can you secure millions against assets already fully secured against, why would KA take on a personal debt for millions knowing he couldn't pay it back, why would Eddie secure the debt against the ownership of BWFC if he didn't want to own it again, why did the Administrator EDT appointed, knock off £7.5m from EDT's own claim, where did that £7.5m go, etc, etc???

The Devil is in the detail as you full well know.

You've stated an hypothesis of what you believed happened, I don't disagree with it, but you have yet to prove it and if by any chance you were hoping to use me to do the research for this, then I'm sorry I've failed.

As far as I'm concerned and in the words of the song - There are more questions than answers and the more I find out the less I know.

I can't prove your hypothesis although I would have loved to have done.

If you HAVE proved it, then good for you, and if you want to share it with me then I'd be pleased to hear it and if you don't then I'll simply have to continue to live in ignorance of it like nearly everyone else is as I'm nowhere near as clever as you are in your field to work it out for myself.

Have a nice day.

Come now Sluffy, what Bob means is this. The rest of us get it.

Bob is without doubt the person with the most understanding of what has gone on financially for the last decade or more at BWFC, without having insider information, that has made his opinion known publicly.

He's been able to achieve this based on his expertise and many years knowledge as an accountant who is clearly at the top of his profession.

I state this on the basis that there have been several self proclaimed accountants (and I have no reason to doubt they are not) who have express their opinions from time to time, that have proved to be wrong.  

Bob has consistently be proved right time and time again over this period.

Bob has we know (and love...!) has his way about him - for instance he clearly doesn't suffer what he may consider 'fools gladly'.

I'm constantly indebted to the insights he  has frequently given me, even though he may consider me one of the 'fools' from time to time (my listening ears and thinking head missing occasionally for instance).

I for my sins am a person who likes to 'understand' things, I'm one of those who likes to puzzle things out.  For some reason I do not know myself, it is not enough for me to be 'told' something, I somehow have the need to 'understand' it too.

I don't doubt what Bob has stated above is true, I just can't puzzle out the mechanics of it - that is all.

I'm not accusing Bob as being wrong (if he thinks that) I just can't see how he is right - if you get my nuance?

For instance asking why EDT appointed Administrator didn't include the hotel at the time is I believe a reasonable question to ask - the hotel was deliberately left for KA to appoint his Administrator (the next day iirc?)

This clearly wasn't an oversight, it was done so (imo) as an agreement between the two camps (EDT and KA's).  There were already at the initial stage some sort of disagreement on the way forward otherwise both camps could have worked together under one Administrator and saved themselves the additional extra costs of having two Administrators involved.

I've also asked repeatedly - from the time KA 'secured; his loan, how could he do so on assets that already were full charged previously - For instance I insure my car once only - it is illegal for me to insure it with 17 other insurance companies and claim of all 18 of them if I crash my car and write it off - so how can say as an example Eddie, PBP and KA claim they've secured their loans of say £7.5m against say the hotel which when sold in Administration is worth only £7.5m and not the £22.5m needed to pay them all off?

What I'm saying basically is I can't 'understand' what Bob is 'telling' me - as I can't get it to work in my head.

I'm not saying it doesn't work, but I am saying I'm not knowledgeable or educated enough to be able to see how it does.

Maybe Bob feels it is somehow beneath him to explain this to the 'fool' that I am, I don't know, all I know is what he says, I can't prove to my satisfaction and no matter how big a genius Bob may be, for all I know he might have made a misjudgement or something somewhere along the line?

Even Einstein made errors - his famous one being the 'cosmological constant'.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein%27s_static_universe

He was also wrong about 'entanglement' in quantum physics if anyone is interested...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein%E2%80%93Podolsky%E2%80%93Rosen_paradox


Anyway to paraphrase Shakespeare's Mark Anthony, I've not set out to query Bob, I've set out to understand him if I could - but failed.

That's all.

You understand more than I do, Sluffy. I've admitted before that this is pretty much a closed book to me, and when I have tried to educate myself I've painted myself into quite a corner.
It's like that old trope about the boss asking his accountant how the books were looking, and the accountant replying, "How do you want them to look".
It's a world of magic, smoke, and mirrors to me.
I appreciate the efforts Bob and yourself have put into explaining it, but it's all beyond me I'm afraid.

boltonbonce wrote:You understand more than I do, Sluffy. I've admitted before that this is pretty much a closed book to me, and when I have tried to educate myself I've painted myself into quite a corner.
It's like that old trope about the boss asking his accountant how the books were looking, and the accountant replying, "How do you want them to look".
It's a world of magic, smoke, and mirrors to me.
I appreciate the efforts Bob and yourself have put into explaining it, but it's all beyond me I'm afraid.

I know it must be hard, Boncey. With so many credible candidates it’s almost impossible to figure out who provided the money to repay Blumarble.
Have you got a little hand on that watch yet?

Sorry Sluffy but you are still meandering. Until you understand and accept that the Administrators statement was just plain wrong (in the most significant way) you'll never figure any of it out.

I could quite easily answer each and everyone of your points but it would take more time than I am willing to spend on it and I am far from convinced that it would not just trigger more perambulations.

I am going to put all this on hold for the time being whilst I focus my attention on more pressing and worthwhile tasks before Lady Bobsworth and I depart on our first holiday since COVID.

Ten Bobsworth wrote:
I know it must be hard, Boncey. With so many credible candidates it’s almost impossible to figure out who provided the money to repay Blumarble.
Have you got a little hand on that watch yet?

My watch looks fine to me.