BUNKERED... Wentworth losses mount
Wentworth is stuck in a financial hole as billionaire Chinese owner sees losses double
THE world-famous Wentworth golf course has fallen deeper into the red under its controversial ownership by a Chinese-Thai billionaire.
Losses at the prestigious Surrey golf and country club hit £13million last year – more than double the £5.6million in 2016, while turnover fell from £17.7million to £14.5million, accounts filed last week show.
Chanchai Ruayrungruang bought Wentworth for £135million four years ago from restaurateur Richard Caring. The club runs three championship golf courses, a tennis and health centre and a restaurant, hotel and conference facilities.
Wentworth is ultimately owned by Ruayrungruang’s Reignwood International Holdings, based in the tax haven of the British Virgin Islands.
The club is heavily in debt. It took out a £37million loan last year with the Agricultural Bank of China. This is on top of two existing loans, totalling £135 million owed to Reignwood Global Investment, another part of Ruayrungruang’s sprawling empire. This firm has agreed not to seek repayment until the club can afford to stump up.
Stephen Gibson, the chief executive, said this weekend that the reason for the losses and borrowing is that the club had been on an ambitious investment programme, which is now almost complete. This has involved upgrading the clubhouse, spa and tennis club, as well as the West Course, which hosts the annual BMW PGA championship.
‘Since Reignwood Group took ownership of Wentworth Club, we have always intended to implement an investment programme to improve all facilities at the Club for our members,’ he said.
‘This year alone every step through the famous castellated clubhouse has been refurbished to the highest standard. This work followed the renovation of our West Course and a rebuild of our spa and tennis and health club. These improvements form part of a longterm investment strategy.’
He described the work as very successful, saying it had received positive feedback from members.
Gibson said the club urgently needed £20 million of improvements when Reignwood took over. He said at the time: ‘The club, it’s fair to say, was in a certain state of decline. There had been a lack of investment in certain facilities.’
Despite the money lavished on the club, Ruayrungruang’s ownership has been marked by a series of clashes with members, who include former chat show host Sir Michael Parkinson, former England cricketer Kevin Pietersen and numerous City tycoons.
Longstanding members feared that he would turn the genteel golf club into a vulgar playground for oligarchs.
Parkinson accused Reignwood of ignoring tradition, and of trying to create an elitist club with a ‘car park full of Lamborghinis’.
They threatened legal action when Reignwood tried to cull the 4,000strong membership to less than a quarter of that figure by charging a £100,000 fee for existing members to remain on the books – and £125,000 for new members to join. Reignwood backed down in 2016, and said a new fee scheme would be voluntary.
Ruayrungruang, one of Asia’s richest men with an estimated £8.5billion fortune, is now embroiled in a new dispute with his business partner, Songhua Ni.
Ni, who resigned from Wentworth’s board last summer, alleges that the golf-mad tycoon reneged on a series of promises to reward him for buying Reignwood’s overseas assets. Ruayrungruang has dismissed the spat as ‘a small matter’. Martin Gilbert, the co-chief executive of Standard Life Aberdeen and a golfing chum of President Trump has replaced Ni on the board. Gilbert, who is a friend of Ruayrungruang and his daughter, Woraphanit, joined earlier this year as an adviser. A spokesman for Wentworth declined to confirm current membership numbers. The latest accounts say prospective members are subject to ‘a rigorous admission process’. Over the past decade, Reignwood has also bought a £400million luxury development in the City of London, a golf course in Hawaii and a vineyard venture in Bordeaux.
The club, it’s fair to say, was in a certain state of decline with a lack of investment