Is there a risk Donald will sell to someone other than FPP so he can turn around and say 'told you so!'? I like Donald, I still think his heart is in the right place, but by god he's made some howler decisions of late. His statement is so childish, hard to believe he is a successful businessman who has taken knocks to get to where he is. Completely agree re: the fanzines mate, they made a sweeping statement at awful timing and now the owner and fan reps are sniping at each other. We look ridiculous at the moment.
If that's his plan he's making it really difficult for himself in my opinion most of which this is. He can't take out a secured loan to pay his debt and can't sell his shares as things stand, FPP have those options tied up. No one will buy the club with this 'loan' and the accompanying contract hanging over it. So his only realistic option is to repay the loan and cop the charges which will be substantial. If he does that he would then have to find a buyer who'll risk 'not being Dell' in the eyes of the supporters. He'll then have to go through another lengthy saga of EFL approval, due diligence, etc. If the "buyers' then value the club at less than FPP he's screwed. FPP wanted the club under their terms and would still take it, otherwise why draw up a contract that could easily result in that scenario. The suggestion that FPP would give Donald a pot of money to play with, to see how he did with it, is ridiculous. If he totally messed up FPP 'inherit' a club in trouble. If he does well he can pay off FPP who then get nothing but a bit of interest for all that time, effort and money. They've probably already spent more than that interest with their efforts so far so it would be dreadful business practice. As things stand, depending on whether or not you believe Donald, FPP are currently the biggest investors in the club ... ... Donald is just a man with a sack full of shares and someone else's money.
So,it seems that FPP would not meet SD valuation of the club,but were prepared to advance a loan,with stringent conditions,presumably to give SD a chance to get the club to a point where FPP would agree to his valuation,at which point the loan would be converted into equity. If that is somewhere near the mark,I don't understand why would SD now take the hump with the fanzines and put the club up for sale to anyone other than FPP,which is going to cost him £10m+ interest/penalty before he pockets any proceeds,and which is almost certain to lose the opportunity to reach his valuation?
It's impossible to work out what Donald is doing ... ... I seriously doubt he knows what his end game plan is tbh. Methven is still involved somehow, I can just feel it That club statement looked like something he'd blurt out after a few drinks. He definitely has it in for RAWA and the fanzines
There's probably a good chance that he'll come out with something along the lines of..." I've over-reacted,because I care so much about the club and the fans....I've had time to reconsider and am retracting my previous statement. I'm totally committed to getting this club out of this division and to move things forward from there" The fanzines would then agree they were being hasty and welcome his change of heart. Any chance of that,do you think? As for Methven,I've yet to understand why Davison and him had to leave when they did....complete mystery to me...something's gone on and he may well still be in Donald's ear.
It’s like watching a very public figure starting to have a breakdown imho. He’s not able to deal with the level of criticism coming his way, whether deserved or not, and is on a very childish deflection strategy trying to sway opinion to his side. He did that before remember when he got the twitter abuse, and got loads of sympathy. This time, however, it looks like the majority are calling his bluff and saying “ok then, sell”. My worry is he’s such a flake he’ll simply decide not to, run us on a shoe string and we will be an established third division club before you can say jack robinson.
I would say the likelihood of the extreme interpretations of FPP's motives (they want it all now vs they only want Donald and not the club) are the least likely to be correct. Golden rule in scenarios where you have those two poles is to assume something in-between until proven otherwise. That's why I think them being happy to wait and see and assume a minority interest if all goes well is the most likely. Also... it's exactly what they did when all options were on the table. For example, the loan terms. People are assuming charges and interest etc, but we don't know either exist depending on circumstances. This just isn't your standard loan from the bank. We shouldn't assume either of those things on any scale. I would also add one really crazy thing that I have never seen mentioned - if Donald took $12m and converted it to GBP in early November, he'd actually have made a profit of a few hundred grand just by the leap in currency. eg: $12m at the time = £9.35m today £9.35m = $12.25m But that's by the by, my point is that because the loan is not really designed to 'just be a loan', it could well not be subject to traditional loan rules during the life of it. That means not repaying at regular intervals during the term the way we would on a small secured loan, or having fixed charges, and I think the idea of it having the entire interest calculated up front and added is very very far-fetched. Even SBC didn't do that, put it that way. So the likelihood is there may be a small penalty or interest charge after a month, but it'll almost certainly be offset by gains in currency.
I think FPP will take over in the summer if we go up, I personal think SD said what he did because in his head he thinks he’ll be able to come to the fans In the summer and say “look what I did, I got us promoted and saved the deal with FPP, because of how good Ive made the club”
That's why it doesn't make sense that he threw his toys out the pram, and say I'm off, with that statement. You'd have thought he would've said he's more determined than ever to make it work here.
A very important point to consider with FPP is also that they did this deal, which indicates this was their preferred method of investment. The implication here is that Donald is incompetent and can't have convinced FPP that he's the right man to guide this, but that somehow he then managed to get FPP to do a deal that they didn't want, and on terms that suited him rather than them. That can't be true unless FPP are extremely weak and gullible, neither of which rings true. Quite the opposite in fact. I think based on what he said plus what we already knew about the loan, they wanted this deal to keep their options open, and I think they would have walked away if they didn't. That in turn indicates that they are not wholly ready to dive in as majority owners, which is what I think we should bear in mind if we're expecting a quick situation to develop with them. As Donald said, ultimately, if they wanted to be majority owners, they would be by now. They like the opportunity and apparently, they're willing to see how he does for a few seasons, but it doesn't strictly follow that they'll change their mind on that just yet, for all the reasons of burden, time, effort, risk etc that I've mentioned before. My gut feeling on this and based on what we have seen over the last few weeks is that if we want FPP involved in the long haul, the best route is sadly to stick with Donald. I've been a huge critic of him in the past, but I am confident that if his aim is to convince FPP to take that 20-25% stake and then do more after we get promoted, he'll run the club far better than he did for the first 18 months and may even pay his debts
It's not ****e though is it? I know people prefer 'MY VIEW IS THAT FPP WILL BE MAJORITY OWNERS VERY SOON BECAUSE THEY DID A COMPANY WITH THE SOL AS THE ADDRESS' but it's just illogical. If FPP didn't want to do a convertible loan and didn't agree with Donald's potential valuation of those shares, then they would have walked away. The more likely explanation is that they cajoled him into a very favorable deal for them that gives them flexibility in future and involves zero risk for them.
