Where is the money?

CroJack

Key Player
"There is some confusion and questioning over where the money has gone from Swansea City Football Club since Levien and Kaplan have taken ownership.

Taken out of the club and moved off to D.C United? Helping to pay Wayne Rooney’s ridiculous wages? Those claims are wide of the mark. Why? Simply because the money has been overspent and we’re now paying the price. There’s been rumours that the club is in £30m of debt and when you sum everything up – it’s probably not wide of the mark when we’re looking to get the wage bill down to a manageable level for a Championship club. Our turnover is going to massively decrease and parachute payments probably won’t cover our operating costs – and they decrease further over the next two years."


Read this excellent article here:

https://swansea.vitalfootball.co.uk...ited-financial-accounts-paint-a-bleak-picture
 

Jackflash

Midfield General
Staff member
"There is some confusion and questioning over where the money has gone from Swansea City Football Club since Levien and Kaplan have taken ownership.

Taken out of the club and moved off to D.C United? Helping to pay Wayne Rooney’s ridiculous wages? Those claims are wide of the mark. Why? Simply because the money has been overspent and we’re now paying the price. There’s been rumours that the club is in £30m of debt and when you sum everything up – it’s probably not wide of the mark when we’re looking to get the wage bill down to a manageable level for a Championship club. Our turnover is going to massively decrease and parachute payments probably won’t cover our operating costs – and they decrease further over the next two years."

Read this excellent article here:

https://swansea.vitalfootball.co.uk...ited-financial-accounts-paint-a-bleak-picture
These individual articles written by Kieran Maguire an accountant in Manchester, did he prepare the company books or is he just looking a sets of prepared accounts. There's a big difference. Who in their right mind would want to inherit a football club that was £30M in debt, doesn't say much for Mr Pearlman if true. Can he explain his claim the club was losing almost half a million pounds a week in the premiership, if so yet another reason why no one would want to acquire it. or be in a position to have multi investors wanting to jump on the band wagon. As Jenkins said the American negotiations went on for a full year,are we to believe the yanks stood by and watched the club lose millions and millions of pounds in that 12 months and still wanted to buy it. Lets not be under any doubt that the future of our club was decided by these yanks a couple of years ago and is probably on schedule to produce their financial requirements before they eventually pull the plug. And Jenkins wants our sympathies.
 
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Yankee_Jack

Key Player
To acquire the club, the Yanks must have had a business model that was cash flow positive and gave them a positive NPV at the time they made their bid and closed the deal. No investor would have given so much as a drip of snot to any other model. The question is: did their model include optionality that modeled relegation. If it did then they could now be executing that arm of the model, which could simply be a suck it dry to recoup then walk away strategy. Or, did things just go tits up unexpectantly after the acquisition through bad management and they are now flapping around trying frantically to bail water out of a badly leaking boat with a thimble. I say a thimble because they obviously have no intention of trying to ease the cash crisis through cash infusion into the club.

We have been habitually buying and selling players on factored financing over the term of the player contract. I am guessing that with the poor performance of the players we sold .. e.g, Bony and Ayew ... coupled with their reacquisition really fucked things up and this is coupled with the extensive payments at Prem money to multiple head coaches and their assistants. Why would we reacquire players that were not getting it done somewhere else. We also paid over the top for players, e.g. Clucas, that were not close to Prem level and the moved them out at a discount to cost while still carrying the financing on their acquisition. The Sig trade clearly did nothing to address this situation unless new owners have been issuing dividends along the way.

In retrospect, the bizarre firing of Laudrup is the seed of the rot that followed. That one decision is the moment of conception that has put us where we are now.

If I am correct the Trust has or had a couple of people reviewing the Club’s books on a regular basis. Some statement as to the financial health of the Club should be forthcoming. People on the board of the Trust should have a fairly clear picture of the current state of affairs and the financial directives in force.
 

Jackflash

Midfield General
Staff member
Spot on yankee. I don't think things went tits up after the acquisition, I think the downhill spiral started with the dismissal of Laudrup. I think Laudrup brought the club up to a level that was beyond Jenkins's comprehension, which made it unmanageable to him. Swansea City in the Premiership involved in two cup runs and playing against the elite of Europe, far more than he could handle. He needed a team manager he could talk down to once again, hence Monk. Who immediately took us out of Europe and the cups with weakened teams, probably as instructed. It was then that Jenkins appointed himself as DOF,spent a fortune along with Monk on players when it was the Laudrup squad that gave Monk his self acclaimed highest Premiership finish .But the supreme footballing knowledge of the ex Afon Lido goalkeeper,who along with a Joe Average championship defender decided they knew better, dismantled the team and rebuilt it,and here we are today, halfway down the Championship.
 

Yankee_Jack

Key Player
@Jackflash ... we are half way down the Championship ... we would be at or near the bottom if not for the performance of the U-23 program over the past several years. We are a few quality kids away from L1.
 

Jackflash

Midfield General
Staff member
@Jackflash ... we are half way down the Championship ... we would be at or near the bottom if not for the performance of the U-23 program over the past several years. We are a few quality kids away from L1.
Very true yankee, if it wasn't for the academy we would be in dire straits.
 

CroJack

Key Player
Can he explain his claim the club was losing almost half a million pounds a week in the premiership
I don't understand that part either, I am not an accountant, but there are claims that the operating costs have excedeed the turnover in the recent years.

We all know that Swansea have had the highest wages to turnover ratio of all Premier League clubs in recent years. The question is whether transfer and agent fees and severence packages to sacked managers and backroom staff are included in what we call wages. If not, then the whole financial situation doesn't look good.

I, personally, can't believe that we are in such bad situation because the club books showed significant profit in years previous to 2018.
 

CroJack

Key Player
I think the downhill spiral started with the dismissal of Laudrup. I think Laudrup brought the club up to a level that was beyond Jenkins's comprehension, which made it unmanageable to him.
Agreed.

And Jenkins started to overspend whilst trying desperatly to keep the club in the Premier League with a sole goal to sell the club and pocket the money.
 
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