The QPR New Investment Thread

[Atouk]

The old thread about new investment coming into the club can be found here (http://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showthread.php?t=111472). Since the Krause bid is no longer active, I figured the title (re: "American" investment) was a bit misleading and it was time to start a fresh thread.

Anyway, the news today from the official site (http://www.qpr.premiumtv.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10373~552872,00.html) is that the Monte Carlo group (described as a "New York based Monte Carlo investment group") has bought a 10% share of the club for £550,000, with the option to buy a further 19.9% in the coming months.

With a £2 million bill to the taxman outstanding, the funds are obviously quite welcome. If they buy in for the full 29.9%, that'll mostly pay that debt.

Mr. Andrea Primicerio has been added to the board to represent Barnaby Holdings, the new investment group.

Bill Power says about the new group:
"We are delighted to be able to confirm Barnaby Holdings' investment in Rangers, and we look forward to working with people who are committed to helping move our Club forward.
"Mr Primicerio and his consortium are purely football-focused people and they share our ambitions for the Club."The official site says Power will speak more about the investment on QPR World tomorrow -- I'll update then.

[AEK]

If I only had a few million lying around....

[QPR Kevin H]

If I only had a few million lying around....
Well... keep working on it! ;)

[Atouk]

Bill Power's interview is up on QPR World now. He says "everyone will be very pleased" when the new ownership group announces who they are. He says they're football people who are interested in seeing QPR do well. They have no plans to tell the Board or Olly how to run things, but rather are "what do you need?" kind of people. He expects them to soon take up the option to buy another 19.9% of the club.

He said some people who contact them about investment in the club are pretty clearly only interested in the stadium/land, but that these are people who are interested in football.

He was impressed with their appointee on the board, Andrea Primicerio, who BP says is an accountant and has already given them some good ideas to save money.

He says the group knows a lot about football, although not necessarily about English football.

When asked why they're paying 5.5 p per share, rather than the 6 or 6.5 that has been talked about regarding future sales, he said they'd entered discussions with this group last year at that amount and didn't want to withdraw that offer (and it's pretty clear we needed a cash injection now). He said that the money coming in now will definitely be going to pay down the taxes owed.

He mentioned that the group had spoken to four clubs, but that Rangers had been most "tempting" and by tempting he didn't mean because of a cheap share price, but rather the overall state of the club, etc.

He said "this year, we'll lose money, but next year, if we stay in this division, we'll be able to even give Ian some more money then, there's no doubt about it, and break even. If we do go down, we'll break even next year." We have too, he said. He said we'll lose much less money this year than the last several years.

He mentioned that there are a couple of people interested in buying big chunks of shares and several people interested in buying smaller amounts (but in the "hundreds of thousands of pounds" range, he said), and he said that they're Rangers people, which is a good sign.

Overall, he's convinced that we've "turned the corner" on the financial side. It looks like Olly is going to have to make do with what he had this year and then, if we stay up and things go according to plan, he'll get an increase (slight?) in player budget for next season.

Also, BP was wearing a Nike polo shirt. Got a new sponsorship deal to tell us about, BP? If not, we'd better get you a Le Coq polo! ;)

[Atouk]

In addition to reporting much of the above, The Evening Standard's story (http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/sport/football/articles/12635956?source=Evening%20Standard) on the new investment includes this interesting tidbit:Intriguingly, Standard Sport understands that the consortium includes a famous former international footballer, who has been keen to invest in an English football club for some time.So, possibly some famous former client of Gianni Paladini? I guess this was part of what Power meant when he said people would be pleased when learning about the new investors.

Quotes from Power include:"They are football fans who want to take the club forward," said Power. "They have been over here before and have looked at other clubs. But they liked what they saw at QPR. They were struck by the fantastic atmosphere at Loftus Road, loved the kit and the fact that we are in west London, only a couple of miles from town. They believe it's the nicest part of England to bring players to and they want to have a real pop at being part of a successful football club.

"They can see what the outlays were under the old regime and they can see the changes we've made. We have stopped the haemorrhaging and in a year's time I believe we will be financially sound."

[Maczebus]

Well it seems the famous former international footballer is infact Dunga of Brazil.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/q/qpr/3585782.stm