Bolton's Finances / Accounts for year ending 30th June 2021 and everything else since.

There is a large selection of words to chose from, Sluffy, to describe the failure to honour a debt. Many of them are not very nice. 

Your previous description sanitised the position imo although I wouldn't conclude that that was necessarily your intention. The latest position seems to be that PBP have been 'shoved to the back of the queue' again or the debt 'kicked down the road' if you  prefer.

If I was Tom Morris I would not be amused. Could it be that that's why our shirt sponsors are the Khazi Chiefs and not Home Bargains?

Bob, we have no idea of what the feelings or intentions are of FV and PBP in respect of each other, all we know is what is shown on the accounts.

You may be absolutely right, you may be miles away from the truth.

You disregarded completely what I said some several weeks ago when I stated that the PBP loan had been renegotiated, and poo-poohed me over it - because of your personal and seemingly fixed view on this matter.

You seemed to have placed your personal standpoint in regards to this matter even ahead of the facts so much so that I had to remind you of what the accounts had actually stated in order to end your continual ridiculing.

Anyway, whatever has gone on/is going on, it seems the debt is finally being addressed.

If I've read the accounts correctly PBP should have received in August 2023 a quarter payment  of the £5.5m loan, and if so should be reflected in the next accounts ending June 2024.

You are the expert when it comes to accountancy Bob, not me, and you have helped and guided me tremendously over the last few years, which I fully acknowledge and thank you for.

However you are not always correct in your interpretations (you recently challenged me to prove you wrong before - and I DID, as I'm sure you  remember!) and I'm not always wrong in mine.

I'm not here to challenge, upstage or undermine you or whatever you may want to believe, I simply am trying my best to understand what's happening at the club we all support - and I will continue my best to do that with or without your help and support.

As I am fond of sayings, it would seem fitting to end by saying 'two brains are better than one' but with Barry and now Terry's input perhaps I should say 'many brains are better than one' (apart from cooks - when they are making broth!).

I (and hopefully many others) would love to know if you agree or not with my analysis of what I've spotted from the accounts and what other nuggets you find that I have missed.

Up to you of course if you wish to do so or not.

Silly question, Sluffy, but  was it a 5-minute argument you wanted or the full half-hour?

I'm not looking for an argument I never do.

I just call out fantasy, fake news, bullshit and lies.

And you are no exception to that.

PBP have the power to enforce the loan - and haven't.

If they are in a confrontational position with FV then why have they waived £1.7m in interest charges owed to them???

Why have they then willingly renegotiated the loan further until 2026?

They have the same security on the hotel as BluMarble held - namely a charge over the legal mortgage of the Hotel (Charge Code 1208 6161 0005)

BluMarble threatened to enforce the debt owed to them by foreclosure of the hotel.

BluMarble was promptly settled.

PBP could do the exact same thing if they are in a confrontational position with FV as you clearly believe they are because they want their money back.  It states so in the charge under 10.2 Discretion (page 23) of the contract between PBP and FV.

They haven't - they've first let the debt extend beyond the payment day, they then appeared to write off £1.7m owed to them in interest and agreed to a down payment and payment in full for a further years extension, and now a further renegotiation to a settlement three years later

BluMarble wanted their money back and got it.

PBP could easily do the same but instead has in effect allowed a 5 year loan turn into a 10 year one, waived all the interest to date apparently and have received only one payment instalment in seven years (and we don't know for sure that they even received that for definite!).

If Tom Morris really wanted his money back he would have got it by now.

Dale Vince wanted his money - and got it (well he got his player back in lieu of it) by threatening a Winding Up Order.

BluMarble wanted their money back - and got it by threatening a Winding Up Order.

According to you PBP want their money back but instead have been forced to wait 10 years instead of 5 for it, not been paid a penny until last year (7 years from the start of the loan) happily wrote off £1.7m of interest owed to them, and renegotiated the loan TWICE more instead of simply foreclosing on the hotel.


The facts suggest PBP are bending over backwards to help FV out and not in a war against them for repayment - doesn't it?

And if all of that doesn't convince you it isn't a soft loan - then take a look at the signatures of the deed...














...Michael James signed on behalf of both FV AND PBP!!!


Kia ora to you - as the Maori's say.

So it’s the full half-hour. And then some.

Bob, you certainly like to think you know it all - but you don't.

You have exactly the same knowledge as I do on this as we simply haven't been party to the negotiations and multiple subsequent discussions and agreements with those involved with the loan and following changes to it.

YOU have decided that PBP have had their pants pulled down by FV who have not honoured the debt - and maybe you are correct BUT you DON'T KNOW that to be a fact, it is only your OPINION on what MIGHT be the case.

I've put forward a different and completely rational view based on the same information you had, starting from when FV took on the loan, under a new contract signed on the 28th August 2019 between FV and PBP and was signed on behalf of both parties by Michael James in his capacity as an authorised person to do so by both parties (borrowing - one of the owners of FV) and (lending - one of the Directors of PBP) to the loan.

(Isn't that similar in many ways to what Eddie Davies did being himself both owner of Burnden Leisure and provider of loans from his own company Moonshift - and wasn't that seen as a 'soft' loan?)

We already knew from the previous accounts that PBP offered to write off the accrued interest if the loan was settled in full and we now also know that that arrangement was superseded by an agreement to extended the loan by a further year for a 25% down payment off the loan and full settlement a year later (August 2024) and that the £1.7m interest on the loan to that point was written off.

Seems to me there was still plenty goodwill between both parties at that point - otherwise why didn't PBP simply just enforce the loan as per the contract terms - ie take ownership of the hotel?

It seems that even the year extension settlement needed yet a further negotiation and a new agreement was reached with a 25% down payment and a further 3 year extension (now to August 2026) with three equal payment of the remaining loan being paid annually.

Now if I was PBP and wanted my money back would I really want to keep giving FV more and more time if all they've been doing is screwing me over, time and time again???

Would I fuck and neither would you, nor anyone else with a brain in their head.

My guess is that it is far more likely that the PBP loan money is actually in someway James own personal money (or rather money under James control) and that he has side agreements elsewhere with Morris in respect of this sum.

Whatever the agreement may be between them (or even if I'm completely wrong that such an agreement exists) the simple fact remains that PBP have not taken one single step to call in their debt and instead given FV every single opportunity to defer and extend repayments and even written off £1.7m owed to them in non paid interest on the loan.

So which is the more plausible explanation of the facts as we know them - your continual screwing of PBP by FV for the last 5 years or my soft loan facility?

Neither of us know what it really is - you just ACT as though you do.

Kia ora again to you.

One thing I know for sure, Sluffy, is that you 'lost it' some time ago.

Lets be succint, I also know that it would be folly to even begin to explain the mindless meanderings and multiple misrepresentations that in your head passes for 'thinking'.

Sluffy wrote:Bob had a pop at me because he doesn't like to be stood up to, nothing at all to do with this thread at all.

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Point proven.

Poor old Sluffy. He's not the purveyor of long-winded, rambling, prattle that we know and love so well. And heaven forbid that anyone should think he was the kind of person that could start an argument in an empty room.

Oh no, that must be someone else. Sluffy's just the misunderstood victim of naughty boys out to do him down; a bit like Prince Harry and Humza Yousaf.

Maguire has posted up some charts for last seasons accounts for our division.

The only thing that really caught my eye was that apparently the players average weekly wage last season was £10,000 per week - it's obviously going to be more this season with the signings we have made.

Tom Morris has risen to No.25 on the latest Sunday Times Rich List. That's four places higher and £540million richer than the previous year.

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So he's not likely to be losing too much sleep over how much FV still owe PBP but I expect he'd still like his money back and I think it unlikely that he would be keen on chipping in with the extra £20million p.a. Auntie Sharon reckons BWFC would need to be a competitive Championship team.

In other news, it seems that Pewit Hall and 'high-classy equestrian facility' is still up for sale.
This is the place Eddie Davies spent a small part of his fortune on before he (and Sue Davies) died.
I expect its owned by the Eddie Davies Trust.

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At her meeting with the parliamentary committee the other day she mentioned about five investors who have been with her on her 'journey' but I couldn't think who after, James, Luckock, (who hold shares in their own names) and Mason and Keith Morris (the car insurance bloke)(who Sharron acts as proxy for) was the fifth?

She talked (in the abstract) about asking these five investors for £20m per season for BWFC to be competitive in the Championship - but who is the 'fifth man' (or woman)?

Was she talking about herself in the third person or, as crossed my mind at the time, could it be Tom Morris, being the man in the sense of not investing money into the club but rather by not taking his money out of it?

Other names that crossed my mind were Jeff Thomas and Parminder Basran who were there at the very start but seemed to bail out quite quickly, and the Swiss and Ian Riley but they came along much later.

I've always found it a bit odd that Sharon's credo seems to be about doing the right thing (which I try to do myself in my life too fwiw) but simple information such as to the names of those who actually own the club have never actually been made public?

If everything is above board and honest - which I believe it to be, then why the apparent obfuscation and secrecy over such things?

I thought Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason was involved in this somehow?

Norpig wrote:I thought Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason was involved in this somehow?

We believe he is.

We believe he and another rich bloke called Keith Morris own shares in FV along with Michael James (who is one part of Prescott Business Park (PBP)) Luckock and Sharon.  James and Luckock  hold shares in their own names whilst the shares of the other three seem to be controlled by Sharon under her own name only.

She seems to act as proxy for the other two.

I must stress that although 'we' are fairly certain this is the case for Mason, there seems to be less 'clues' for Keith Morris being the same as such but it would make a lot of sense from all that we know, that he is.


Proxy
noun

A person holding authority to act for another


There was in the beginning another bloke called Jeff Thomas who appeared to be part of the group in starting FV up but it looks like although he was issued shares in the company never actually paid for them, and they were then taken back and 'cancelled' (if that is the right terminology?).

Prescot Business Park is a company with two shareholders, the minority shareholder is Michael Janes and the majority shareholder TOM Morris which had loaned £5.5m to Eddie Davies' Burnden Leisure, and when it collapsed into Administration/Liquidation, agreed to transfer this debt on to FV.

Bob has always been of the view that PBP were desperate to be repaid on time by FV, I do not share that view.  PBP has the legal powers to call in the loan OR take ownership of the assets the loan is secured against (which is the hotel) once the settlement date is passed and they have not only NOT called in the loan or seized assets they have legal right to, but instead have now entered into a brand NEW loan agreement, extending the period for a further THREE MORE YEARS for the loan to be paid back!

Why would PBP do that if the non payment of the (by now) long overdue repayment of the loan to them was a major bone of contention for them???

This has been one of the three 'tensions' that have strained (and probably now busted completely) the 'bromance' between Bob and I, the others being the actions of the Administrator in respect of striking down some of the secured creditor claims of EDT and Ken Anderson, and the current ongoing saga of the conspiracy theory Bob believes in which a succession of governments from 1999 to the present, together with the Post Office Board have knowingly hidden and suppressed all knowledge of the scandal of the sub-postmasters and the failings of the Horizon system.

A bit of a longwinded explanation to your simple question, sorry for that.

In my post above I was musing as to if TOM Morris was the 'fifth investor' 'from the start' as in being an 'active' investor IN FV by NOT taking his investment out (ie the PBP loan) but rather by leaving it in AND extending the loan for a further THREE YEARS - as per what was documented in the last reported accounts, had happened.

No doubt I will be at the receiving end of Bob's childish name calling yet again for challenging one of his conspiracy theories by drawing attention to facts that seem to be getting in the way of his version events that he won't (more likely can't) back up with hard facts supporting his theory.

You are such a confused distorter and dissembler of the truth, Sluffy, that it would not be at all difficult to imagine you working for the Post Office.

Ten Bobsworth wrote:You are such a confused distorter and dissembler of the truth, Sluffy, that it would not be at all difficult to imagine you working for the Post Office.

And you Bob lived your life dealing in facts and all you do now is completely ignore them.

The Administrator followed Insolvency Law - your conspiracy theory says he simply went rogue - yet you give ZERO facts to support your case.

The Administrator (the insolvency expert) whose job it is to represent the Insolvency Court - breaking the law and making things up to punish Anderson???

Tom Morris wants his money back - your conspiracy theory - but Morris actually writes off the interest owed to him (over £1m) and gives a further THREE YEAR EXTENSION for the money to be repaid.

Why would he do that if it was his money he urgently wanted back so urgently???

The Powers That Be (the government and the Post Office Board) have their hands all over the scandal since day one back in 1999 - your conspiracy theory - yet as late as a year or so before the High Court trial, the government told the Post Office they had to commission an independent report (The Swift Report) that broadly sided with the PO position but did flag up that there was a major concern over how they went about prosecutions of the SPMs.  This report was kept SECRET to the Board (based on BAD legal advise) - thus neither the government nor the PO Board knew about the scandal that had been going on in their ignorance - because it had been kept hidden from their eyes.

The government instructing the Post Office to appoint a QC to do an independent report and to finally get to the truth to what is actually happening at the Post Office, whilst for the previous FIRTEEN YEARS or so the government fully knew and was covering it all up???

You've really lost the plot big time Bob!

And if you can imagine me working for the Post Office then I can imagine you being the Emperor in the fairy tale, The Emperors New Clothes, as you clearly imagine you are better than everyone else, intimidate all those below you and everybody can see what an utter berk you really are but they are to afraid of your power over them to tell you.

Well you have no power over me, you don't intimidate me, and I don't rise to your childish insult baiting.

So what you going to do about it?

Complain about my spellings again???

You just can't help it, can you Sluffy?

As for Auntie Sharon, we don't know exactly who she was not counting in her 'five investors'. She wouldn't have included the 'B' shares but there are six registered shareholders with 'A' shares.
i.e investors who have put in money and have votes.

One of these, UKFF Nominees, is the government and I wouldn't have expected her to count them.

Shares held in Sharon's name include Nick Mason and Keith Morris but there doesn't seem to be much likelihood of more coming from that direction. The other two of five founder investors are Mike James and Nick Luckock.

The biggest investor in recent times has been the Swiss group, BMLL, involving Nick Luckock's brother. BMLL has 'invested' nearly £10m in the last couple of years. Another £1m has come in from Ian Riley, not to mention, of course, £4.5m from supporters by way of repayable loans. In theory these loans are repayable but where's the money going to come from?

Ken Anderson 'invested' £6.5m in his last year of ownership but it wasn't nearly enough to keep the wolf from the door and, in all probability, it was money he personally borrowed from Eddie Davies and/or the Eddie Davies Trust. 

£5m of this was to repay the Blumarble loan signed off by Dean Holdsworth. The rest, so far as I can figure out, was probably part of a deal agreed with Eddie in March 2016 which continued to have effect after Eddie's death in September 2018.

Ten Bobsworth wrote:You just can't help it, can you Sluffy?

As for Auntie Sharon, we don't know exactly who she was not counting in her 'five investors'. She wouldn't have included the 'B' shares but there are six registered shareholders with 'A' shares.
i.e investors who have put in money and have votes.

One of these, UKFF Nominees, is the government and I wouldn't have expected her to count them.

Shares held in Sharon's name include Nick Mason and Keith Morris but there doesn't seem to be much likelihood of more coming from that direction. The other two of five founder investors are Mike James and Nick Luckock.

The biggest investor in recent times has been the Swiss group, BMLL, involving Nick Luckock's brother. BMLL has 'invested' nearly £10m in the last couple of years. Another £1m has come in from Ian Riley, not to mention, of course, £4.5m from supporters by way of repayable loans. In theory these loans are repayable but where's the money going to come from?

Ken Anderson 'invested' £6.5m in his last year of ownership but it wasn't nearly enough to keep the wolf from the door and, in all probability, it was money he personally borrowed from Eddie Davies and/or the Eddie Davies Trust. 

£5m of this was to repay the Blumarble loan signed off by Dean Holdsworth. The rest, so far as I can figure out, was probably part of a deal agreed with Eddie in March 2016 which continued to have effect after Eddie's death in September 2018.

If you mean that I can't help myself standing up to arrogant, think they know-it-all bullies, then you are probably right.

I don't like lies, deceit and bullshit but I'm not mad enough to challenge everything just the bits I know something about or where I can put forward a case that even the 'smart' ones like yourself, can't refute.

If you listen closely Sharon says this on the video from 14:41:05 onwards

"I've got five original investors in Bolton Wanderers who have bought in to the journey and supported me all the way... for me to go back to the investors to say we need £20m each season...".

IV'E got FIVE INVESTORS

The FIVE investors SUPPORTED HER  


She's GOT five original investors who were there at the beginning to now - (NOT there are four original investors plus myself)

She clearly didn't say there were five of US who invested in BWFC from the start.

Sounds from what she said to the committee that she had an idea and pitched it to five 'dragons' (think Dragons Den) who invested their money into her and her project.

Hasn't there always been a vagueness as to how many moneymen have been involved with FV from the start?

For instance it was apparently six including Jeff Thomas, then just three when we saw the first significant Confirmation Statement at Companies House, then five when Sharon did the interview with the bloke from the accountancy company (or wherever he worked).

If there really are five investors AND Sharon - after all that's what she said and here is the poof she did...

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...then which other investor could it be?

Might it not be Tom Morris, who was right there from the start - let us not forget he COULD have demanded payment of his secured loan on Burnden Leisure and thus forcing the club into liquidation - but he didn't.

He's also since waived £1.6m (iirc) of accrued interest charges from FV and extended the repayment of the loan for a further three years.

Hardly the actions of someone who simply wanted their money back over FIVE YEARS ago - is it?

Could it be there were five people including Sharon who put NEW money into FV from the start and a sixth. if you like, who already had EXISTING money in FV from the beginning with Tom Morris (as PBP) - with the five investors putting more money into FV and Morris not taking his OUT of FV (waiving all interest) and extending repayment for SEVEN YEARS after FV took it on?


I'm not claiming I am right, nobody outside FV knows for sure but it seems far more logical, believable and fits the facts (interest wrote off, three year extension to settlement date) than your fact free conspiracy theory and until you or anybody else can shoot it down in flames - and you can't - then you are correct, I will stand up for myself against you - no matter how much you don't like anyone doing so - and you clearly don't!

Kia ora, old bean.

Sluffy wrote:The more interesting thing to all this to me is where FV are getting their transfer war chest from?

So either the club will be issuing a further issues of shares (Sharon et al risking more of their own money), they've taken on new loans (debt that need to be paid back), or they've diluted even more the existing equity in the club (which means in simple terms the existing shareholders will not get back their initial investment if the business is sold at this point in time).

But the point is that money is coming in from somewhere...

And just to underline my point it seems Companies House have just received notice from FV TODAY that they are in the process of changing their Articles of Association (which in simple terms is the rules they set for themselves on how legally to run their business).

There must be a need to do so for some good reason - that wasn't there previously?

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