The Bullshit Papers

boltonbonce wrote:I'm a Beano man all the way, although the cover price of £2.75 is a bit much, so I'd advise a subscription.
Brings it down to £2.08.

Don't miss out on the Beano Annual, Boncey.  On offer at Waterstones for £6.99 but only those stores that have copies in stock. You might be lucky in Warrington, unless its a Beano hotspot and has sold out.

Ten Bobsworth wrote:On offer at Waterstones for £6.99

On offer? You must like having your pants pulled down!

Lidl had them in at £3.99!

Note to Nat.
Don't blame me for this. Bob started it. He mentioned the Beano. I'm blameless.

karlypants wrote:

On offer? You must like having your pants pulled down!

Lidl had them in at £3.99!

Now you're telling me.

boltonbonce wrote:Note to Nat.
Don't blame me for this. Bob started it. He mentioned the Beano. I'm blameless.

Don't blame me either. I'm only keeping you up to date on the superhero that is Marcus the Marv and other such literary masterpieces.

I can't see that Alex has formed a company yet to collect the royalties. I do hope Marcus the Marv is going to share some of them.

Ten Bobsworth wrote:
Now you're telling me.

Leave it until after Christmas and you'll get it for £1.99.

boltonbonce wrote:
Leave it until after Christmas and you'll get it for £1.99.

That's just not right though is it, Boncey? Devaluing the work of D C Thompson to that extent.
Its like asking Marcus the Marv to turn out for less than £200k per week.

Anyway Christmas is coming and it just wouldn't be Christmas without Charles Chickens and Kevin the Carrot.

https://www.aldi.co.uk/kevin

Ten Bobsworth wrote:I do keep having a look from time to time to try to see where Sharon's money has come from. She has a lot of directorships but most of 'em don't seem to amount to much and I never believed that this often referred to 'line of credit' idea amounted to much either.

Has Sharon put in any more than her £1.25m share capital? That's not very much at all but I'm not sure that she has and I can't blame her if she hasn't.

I'm afraid that I'm not perceiving any viable long-term plan. More a continuation of financial constraints until someone appears with more money than they need or know what to do with.

Sorry for the late response to this Bob.

I too have no idea who or what is really underwriting FV or if the 'line of credit' is really a line of credit at all but if you look at things from the opposite way about then someone is funding the running of the club, somehow.

The club (I should really refer to it as 'the business', not least as FV owns the hotel as well - albeit indebted significantly to PBP) was given a thumbs up from the auditor at the last accounts - in terms of it being a going concern and will cover its running costs over the next financial year in question - which of course would take us through the deadline for settling the outstanding unsecured debtors from the Admin period.

Similarly, at least on the surface, there appears no concern from everyday creditors and suppliers that their accounts aren't being settled on time and apparently no disgruntled employees leaking on social media that things are bad within the club - no hint of players not getting their wages or stock not being ordered when needed, etc.

I know appearances can be deceiving but it does seem the the club which is almost certainly operating at a trading loss is being financed by other than its revenue streams.

I can only conclude from that, that the company is deemed to be credit worthy by the various credit reference agencies for businesses.

On the surface I can only see that to be seen to be possible initially by the two loans on FV's books by Sharon and Luckock, and since the 1st November, the assets of the company that are now free of Sharon and Luckock's charges that were satisfied on that date.

How the cash flow is being managed, I have no idea and can only assume someone is dipping into their pockets and/or there is some external funding, such as Covid Business Loans that we won't know about until the next accounts are published.

The bottom line for now I guess is that everyone seems ok with the current financial position of the business?

So much so that Evatt is even talking about having a transfer budget for the January window! -

"Evatt is confident that he will get the financial backing he needs in January to strengthen sufficiently, and a shortlist of potential names has now been established between himself and Chris Markham, the club’s technical performance director.

“The board has backed me from day one and they know I am respectful of their money. We will try and do things the right way but there is money available to spend".

No need to apologise, Sluffy.


In addition to the liabilities taken over from the administrators, FV have taken on three new loans for £4.5m, £5m and £3m respectively.

All the loans seemed to involve the shareholders/directors in one way or another though the £5m was COVID-related and was presumably backed or financed by the government support schemes.

I have to say that most of this seems to have gone under the radar. Nowt in the Beeno, of course, and nothing on social media either from what I've seen but you'll find the detail (or at least some of it) in the notes to the Football Ventures (Whites) 2020 accounts.


£2.75m was used to do a deal with the ED Trust under which they'd get half of the money previously agreed plus further payments dependent on promotion. An additional £250K will have been payable following last season's promotion.

The rest of the cash seems to have been used to support the ongoing business or operating losses.

Last month another document was filed at CH showing that these loans together with unpaid interest had now been converted into share capital. Having said that, I can make neither moss nor sand of the other parts of this document at the moment. It would be interesting to know what the shareholdings are now.

P.S. There are also new Mem. and Arts. I haven't read them all but couldn't help noticing that the 'drag along' clause (clause 22) now requires only 65% agreement (previously 75%).

If you get round to looking at UK FF Nominees, Sluffy, (the £5m convertible loan) you'll see it is a new company (therefore no accounts yet) and seems to be controlled by capital markets specialist J-P Nowacki. I expect FF might be short for football finance.

https://www.cscglobal.com/cscglobal/pdfs/J-P%20Nowacki%20Biography.pdf

A couple of other things to mention are the significant costs of the administration and payments to unsecured creditors. I don't know how much is still outstanding but FV have had instalment plans in place for some of these.

The two remaining secured creditors (PBP and Brett Wartburton) amount to £8m in total (excluding interest) and are still outstanding. PBP have agreed to waive all interest charges if the loan is repaid by 1 August 2022.

If the ST had anything about them, they'd have been asking questions about BWFC finances.

For example, in August 2020 the club borrowed £5m from UK FF Nominees Ltd  repayable in 3 years time at an interest rate of 8%.

FV's audited 2020 accounts, filed in July 2021,  stated that:

'The scheme aims to support companies during the Coronavirus (COVID19) outbreak'.

What scheme and who is actually funding it?

It goes on to say that:

'The loan amount plus any accrued interest will convert into shares in the company in several different scenarios, one of which is on the maturity date if the loan is not repaid'.

Lets just say that it would be quite a challenge for FV to find £5m to repay the loan or pay 8% interest but if the scheme has been funded by government cash or guarantees who gets to own the shares when the loan is converted into shares?

P.S. The government doesn't have its own money, just taxpayers money.

Has anyone else been wondering if UK FF Nominees Ltd has made convertible loans to any other UK football clubs or companies that own UK football clubs? If so which ones and why? What's in it for them?

Ten Bobsworth wrote:If the ST had anything about them, they'd have been asking questions about BWFC finances.

For example, in August 2020 the club borrowed £5m from UK FF Nominees Ltd  repayable in 3 years time at an interest rate of 8%.

FV's audited 2020 accounts, filed in July 2021,  stated that:

'The scheme aims to support companies during the Coronavirus (COVID19) outbreak'.

What scheme and who is actually funding it?

It goes on to say that:

'The loan amount plus any accrued interest will convert into shares in the company in several different scenarios, one of which is on the maturity date if the loan is not repaid'.

Lets just say that it would be quite a challenge for FV to find £5m to repay the loan or pay 8% interest but if the scheme has been funded by government cash or guarantees who gets to own the shares when the loan is converted into shares?

P.S. The government doesn't have its own money, just taxpayers money.

My background is in the public sector, so I'm out of my depth on stuff like this but fwiw I've found this which I believe is the Q and A for the scheme.

https://www.british-business-bank.co.uk/ourpartners/coronavirus-business-interruption-loan-schemes/future-fund/faqs-for-investors/

If it is then this may be of interest -

When can the Loans convert into equity?

The Loans can convert into shares in the Investee Company in a variety of circumstances, including fundraisings, exit events and upon the maturity of the Loans. Please note that Loans may alternatively be repaid on an exit event or at their maturity date either at the election of Investors or, in certain cases, automatically.

When will the Loans mature?

The Loans will mature 36 months after the execution date of the CLA.

Can an Investee Company repay the Loans if it chooses?

The Investee Company cannot choose to repay its Loan. The Loans will either convert into shares or be repayable in certain circumstances, such as: specific exit events; maturity of the Loan; or on an event of default by the Investee Company.

In the scenario where the Loans convert, which government entity would be on the relevant Investee Company’s cap tables?

UK FF Nominees Limited. This entity holds legal title to the Future Fund’s Loans and any shares resulting from their conversion on behalf of the government.

Also does this mean that if and when FV pays back the loan does it get a 20% discount?

What is the conversion discount rate?

The conversion discount will be 20%, unless a higher rate has been agreed with the Investee Company and the Investors (other than the Future Fund). Please refer to CLA for further details.


As for the last part you raised Bob about the state owning the shares then I would imagine it would be the same as when they bailed out the banks a few years ago, took shares in lieu and in due course sold them off to recoup whatever they could.

Thanks for that, Sluffy.

Clear as mud, isn't it? FV get a £5m loan from a government funded company (call it govco for short) that FV will never have to repay unless there's an 'exit event'.

The document filed at CH last month says that shares to a value of £41,250.46 have been issued in exchange for three loans totalling £12.5m (including the £5m loan and accrued interest). These loans have plainly not been repaid. Has there been an 'exit event' and where did the other £7.5m come from?

And isn't it odd that no-one else seems to have noticed? Wouldn't you agree that we might need Nuts' resident 'smoke and mirrors' supremo to explain it all now that Lusty's finished his snorkelling furlough? It should be right up his street, shouldn't it?

Ten Bobsworth wrote:Thanks for that, Sluffy.

Clear as mud, isn't it? FV get a £5m loan from a government funded company (call it govco for short) that FV will never have to repay unless there's an 'exit event'.

The document filed at CH last month says that shares to a value of £41,250.46 have been issued in exchange for three loans totalling £12.5m (including the £5m loan and accrued interest). These loans have plainly not been repaid. Has there been an 'exit event' and where did the other £7.5m come from?

And isn't it odd that no-one else seems to have noticed? Wouldn't you agree that we might need Nuts' resident 'smoke and mirrors' supremo to explain it all now that Lusty's finished his snorkelling furlough? It should be right up his street, shouldn't it?

Possibly I'm not understanding the details fully but I read them as the loan matures in 36 months and one of the stated specific exit events is payment due on the maturity of the loan?

So I assume FV could in practise settle the loan without them turning into share equity?

I guess what as happened is Sharon and Luckock have 'released' their 'theoretical' charges over FV's assets and in effect replaced them with the Covid load from govco (or more properly I believe - UK FF Nominees Ltd).

Maybe Sharon and/or Luckock (or others) will pay-off these loans in 3 years and replace them with their own loans if they think it is a better position for them to be in at that time?

As for Wanderlust he never shows his face when he's been called out and that includes being called out by others on here not just by me.

I can't really blame anyone else for not noticing what financially has been happening at the club during Covid and the introduction of the government schemes as most fans have already shown their complete and total disinterest (and continued total ignorance) of how the club is as a business (and how that directly effects what players we put on the field) and the odd few who do haven't covered themselves in glory with their considered 'opinions' of what has happened - I cite as a classic example Wanderlust's declaration that Anderson had plundered a mythical £168m from a club that was actually £200m in DEBT at the time!

I still have a good laugh about that one!!!

Business Advisor - yeah right!!!

I'm pretty certain I'd still be in a fog on most things in this respect without your vast experience and professional knowledge and help and patience in kindly pointing me in the right direction on many occasions.

To be honest I'm a bit lost as to what all these 'govco' Covid loans mean to the future of the club?

Have FV in essence taken on debt to the tune of £12.5m (or at least swopped a theoretical one with a real one) to add to their liabilities in buying the club (and hotel) for which they had already bought for more than what the actual assets were worth?

If so, as and when Sharon/FV wants to 'exit' then to me at least it would seem they would either have to take a considerable loss on their investment or face a future Administration/Liquidation scenario?

Anyway no doubt we will cross that bridge when we come to it.

I'm afraid Sluffy that Bolton Wanderers fans have been fed on a diet of bullshit for years and that's the way they seem to like it in their thousands. Not only do they not want to know or understand the facts many are quite hostile to any informed discussion of them.

Although its depressing its still quite interesting to try to figure out what's really going on behind it all. I think FV were really stretched to get the deal over the line in 2019 and that had very little to do with Ken Anderson's expectations out of it.

£2m has come in from FV for shares and another £12.5m has been borrowed. We know where £5m of that has come from and it looks like its never going to be repaid. Effectively it has all the appearance of a gift from the taxpayer with next to nothing in return.

We don't know how many other clubs have benefited in a similar way or by how much but it does look like FGR's owner was well on the way to benefiting hugely from COVID related finance when the last Ecotricity accounts were published (unusually early) in February .

The info filed at CH still seems a bit sketchy to me and maybe more will be filed in due course. At least I now have a slightly better idea of where BWFC was 'getting all its money from' when my investment advisor asked me the question a few months back.

As for government or local government getting involved in business investment, folk round these parts need no reminding of Blobbygate or the plans to change the name of the railway station near Happy Mount Park to Bare Crinkley Bottom.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crinkley_Bottom

Speaking of Blobbygate, whatever happened to Asonsgate?

I've not been round those parts since I was one of the small number of Bolton fans that attended the Memorial Service of the late Eddie Davies.

https://www.theboltonnews.co.uk/news/16419363.asons-saga-bolton-council-tories-press-fresh-inquiry/

Allardici told Ilesy
"That's the thing to do
I am more than ready
To pull the wool with you"
Wooly bully
Wooly bully

Domingo Samudio/Sam the Sham was known as Big Sam when he was in the US Navy but he later had a huge hit with his recording of Wooli Bully.

Not unlike Big Sam Allardici, Sam the Sham never got to number one in the charts. Allardici hasn't won anything either but he has had a long and lucrative career which he sometimes speaks modestly of whilst employing his own brand of Wooli Bully.