We fear for future after Kroenke shares grab
COMPULSORY purchase! Doesn’t sound good and certainly isn’t when talking about the ‘squeeze-out’ being imposed on all remaining Arsenal shareholders as billionaire American investor Stan Kroenke takes complete control of the club.
In one fell swoop he will be rid of all those pesky shareholders who seek financial transparency and apply accountability by posing questions at the Arsenal AGM.
For me and several hundred other individual shareholders who make up three per cent of the club’s equity it is the end of the road.
I have been proud to be a shareholder for 25 years. Now this custodianship is to ripped from me by an overseas-based investor with little interest in football beyond the riches it can bestow him.
Last week I spoke with the 91-year-old grandaughter of an original subscriber to the share issue in 1910. These shares are still in the family, but not for much longer. There are many such tales as a long chapter in Arsenal’s history comes to an end.
Shareholders have had chances to sell out over the last decade as the Russian/US battle for control has seen increasingly lucrative offers for our shares. That we did not sell was due to this being an emotional, not a financial investment. It can all be dismissed as sentimental codswallop and clearly Kroenke won’t bat an eyelid as the 91-year-old is forced to part with maybe her last link to her grandfather.
As small shareholders we have sought to keep the board honest and Kroenke away from the club’s cash. After pressure at AGMs and unwanted publicity he stopped taking a so-called management fee for ‘advisory services’ that could never be explained. Now the fear is the cash extraction will resume.
The football doyens of leveraged debt finance are the Glazer family at Manchester United. They have taken over £1bn in debt service and fees over the last 13 years.
Kroenke has spent more than £1bn buying shares, partially funded by a loan of £557m, but hasn’t invested a cent into the club. And he has made it clear he has no intention to do so.
Shareholders are more sad than angry as this change has been an inevitability that we are powerless to stop. Rules in the German Bundesliga prevent foreign control of the top clubs but in the Premier League it is a free for all. We will continue to support the club as the next chapter begins. But we do so somewhat sadder and fearful with this loss of custodianship.