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The Herald Scotland
2 hours ago
- Business
- The Herald Scotland
Ex-Celtic captain on why Parkhead fans won't allow an American buyout
The Scot saw at close quarters how the group - which was fronted by former Syrian internationalist Yahya Kirdi, who is now the owner of Laval United in Dubai - moved to within 'a week' of striking a deal with American co-owners Thomas Hicks and George Gillett. A purchase price, the repayment of outstanding bank debt to RBS and Wells Fargo and the financing of a new stadium on a site at Stanley Park were all agreed upon following negotiations between the two parties. Proof of funds was also provided to chairman Martin Broughton. However, one of the four Asian investors who were committed to the project pulled out at the eleventh hour and the agreement to buy Liverpool, who were experiencing serious financial difficulties at the time and were on the brink of bankruptcy, fell through. Lynch was disappointed at the outcome. Read more: 'I got to know one of the potential investors when I was over in America,' he said. 'I played and coached out there for some time and was introduced to him through a mutual acquaintance. I first met him when I was based in Montreal and was playing and coaching in the North American Soccer League. 'He got back in touch when the consortium he was involved with was looking at taking over Liverpool. He flew over to meet me. They were discussing the figures which would be required to buy the club. It was definitely a serious enterprise. 'The discussions went on for several weeks and it did get very close. It fell down at the last minute because the sheikh who was involved was unhappy about one aspect of the deal. But, as I say, it was very close to happening. They had agreed on the fee with Liverpool. It was an incredible thing to be involved in it.' Lynch continued, 'I was an adviser on the football side. It was just as well I was there to be honest because they didn't have a clue about the game. They may have been billionaires and might have been very successful in their fields, but when it came to football they were clueless. I spent my time saying, 'No, you can't do this, no, you can't do that'. 'I can remember being in the boot room at Anfield when the talks were taking place and speaking to Steven Gerrard. He was interested in what we were doing there and was asking me a lot of questions about it. I told him, 'We're possibly doing a deal'. He said, 'That's great, keep me in mind'. 'It didn't come to anything, but it was definitely quite far down the line. Throughout the whole thing I was very excited by what they were proposing. It would have been unbelievable if it had happened. They wanted me to be their figurehead if it went through. It would have been brilliant to be involved in some capacity. As I say, it got very close.' Lynch has been unsurprised that so many major clubs in England and Europe have been snapped up by super-rich investors from the Middle East and the United States in the years since. (Image: SNS Group) Nor was he in the slightest bit taken aback when an American consortium led by Andrew Cavenagh, a healthcare insurance billionaire, and 49ers Enterprises, the business arm of NFL franchise San Francisco 49ers, acquired a 51 per cent stake in Rangers for a cool £75m on Friday. 'The Liverpool takeover bid happened around the time that foreign investors had really started buying into big English football clubs,' he said. 'Just look at the Premier League now. So many of them are owned by overseas businessmen or investment funds. That is even true in the Championship and down the divisions down south. Now it has happened at Rangers with this takeover.' Followers of the Ibrox institution were ecstatic when that transaction was finally, after weeks of speculation, completed. They are optimistic that far better times lie ahead for them both on and off the park and are counting the days until the 2025/26 campaign gets underway. However, Lynch remains completely comfortable with how Celtic, whose major shareholder is billionaire Irish financier and lifelong fan Dermot Desmond, are structured and has no desire to see them follow suit. He expressed doubt that their supporters would accept an outsider with no previous affection for or association with their historic club taking over. Read more: 'The way that Celtic go about their business is still preferrable for me,' he said. 'They are self-sufficient, enjoy consistent success, post profits every year and have money in the bank. They aren't reliant on anyone to bankroll them. I don't think Celtic could go down the route that so many other clubs have, I don't think the fans would ever allow it. 'You never know of course. If they were to lose a few titles then anything could theoretically happen. At the end of the day, money talks. If they ever found themselves unable to compete, maybe the outlook would change. But I do think Celtic supporters would always be eager for a Celtic fan or fans to remain as the major powerbrokers.' Lynch, who scored the winner for Celtic against Rangers in the Scottish Cup final in 1977, was devastated when his old club lost to Aberdeen at Hampden in the denouement of that competition last month and failed to complete a world record ninth domestic treble. (Image: SNS Group) However, he believes the Pittodrie club prevailing is healthy for the national game. He would like to see Brendan Rodgers' men face a far sterner challenge next season than they have in the past few years and is convinced it will help them to excel in Europe if they do. 'The game in this country badly needs somebody to come forward and vie with Celtic for major honours,' he said. 'When I played, we would always get a hard game against the likes of St Mirren, Kilmarnock, Motherwell, whoever. It wasn't just Aberdeen, Hearts and Hibs who were difficult to beat. It wasn't like today when Celtic go out and dominate most games. The majority of teams we faced could compete with us and we always had to play at our best. 'I am a Celtic man and I always want them to win. But for me it has become a little bit too easy in recent years. I think having a greater challenge will be good for them and will ultimately help them when they play in Europe. For me, they should always be looking to compete at the highest level, in the very top bracket, on the continent. 'Rangers really need to get their act together. They are in the throes of bringing in another new manager and they have to get their next appointment right. Other clubs need to improve.'
The National
2 hours ago
- Business
- The National
Ex-Celtic captain on why Parkhead fans won't allow an American buyout
Andy Lynch, who won the Scottish title three times and the Scottish Cup twice during the seven seasons that he spent as a player in the East End of Glasgow in the 1970s, was involved with an international conglomerate which tried to take control of the Anfield giants in 2010. The Scot saw at close quarters how the group - which was fronted by former Syrian internationalist Yahya Kirdi, who is now the owner of Laval United in Dubai - moved to within 'a week' of striking a deal with American co-owners Thomas Hicks and George Gillett. A purchase price, the repayment of outstanding bank debt to RBS and Wells Fargo and the financing of a new stadium on a site at Stanley Park were all agreed upon following negotiations between the two parties. Proof of funds was also provided to chairman Martin Broughton. However, one of the four Asian investors who were committed to the project pulled out at the eleventh hour and the agreement to buy Liverpool, who were experiencing serious financial difficulties at the time and were on the brink of bankruptcy, fell through. Lynch was disappointed at the outcome. Read more: 'I got to know one of the potential investors when I was over in America,' he said. 'I played and coached out there for some time and was introduced to him through a mutual acquaintance. I first met him when I was based in Montreal and was playing and coaching in the North American Soccer League. 'He got back in touch when the consortium he was involved with was looking at taking over Liverpool. He flew over to meet me. They were discussing the figures which would be required to buy the club. It was definitely a serious enterprise. 'The discussions went on for several weeks and it did get very close. It fell down at the last minute because the sheikh who was involved was unhappy about one aspect of the deal. But, as I say, it was very close to happening. They had agreed on the fee with Liverpool. It was an incredible thing to be involved in it.' Lynch continued, 'I was an adviser on the football side. It was just as well I was there to be honest because they didn't have a clue about the game. They may have been billionaires and might have been very successful in their fields, but when it came to football they were clueless. I spent my time saying, 'No, you can't do this, no, you can't do that'. 'I can remember being in the boot room at Anfield when the talks were taking place and speaking to Steven Gerrard. He was interested in what we were doing there and was asking me a lot of questions about it. I told him, 'We're possibly doing a deal'. He said, 'That's great, keep me in mind'. 'It didn't come to anything, but it was definitely quite far down the line. Throughout the whole thing I was very excited by what they were proposing. It would have been unbelievable if it had happened. They wanted me to be their figurehead if it went through. It would have been brilliant to be involved in some capacity. As I say, it got very close.' Lynch has been unsurprised that so many major clubs in England and Europe have been snapped up by super-rich investors from the Middle East and the United States in the years since. (Image: SNS Group) Nor was he in the slightest bit taken aback when an American consortium led by Andrew Cavenagh, a healthcare insurance billionaire, and 49ers Enterprises, the business arm of NFL franchise San Francisco 49ers, acquired a 51 per cent stake in Rangers for a cool £75m on Friday. 'The Liverpool takeover bid happened around the time that foreign investors had really started buying into big English football clubs,' he said. 'Just look at the Premier League now. So many of them are owned by overseas businessmen or investment funds. That is even true in the Championship and down the divisions down south. Now it has happened at Rangers with this takeover.' Followers of the Ibrox institution were ecstatic when that transaction was finally, after weeks of speculation, completed. They are optimistic that far better times lie ahead for them both on and off the park and are counting the days until the 2025/26 campaign gets underway. However, Lynch remains completely comfortable with how Celtic, whose major shareholder is billionaire Irish financier and lifelong fan Dermot Desmond, are structured and has no desire to see them follow suit. He expressed doubt that their supporters would accept an outsider with no previous affection for or association with their historic club taking over. Read more: 'The way that Celtic go about their business is still preferrable for me,' he said. 'They are self-sufficient, enjoy consistent success, post profits every year and have money in the bank. They aren't reliant on anyone to bankroll them. I don't think Celtic could go down the route that so many other clubs have, I don't think the fans would ever allow it. 'You never know of course. If they were to lose a few titles then anything could theoretically happen. At the end of the day, money talks. If they ever found themselves unable to compete, maybe the outlook would change. But I do think Celtic supporters would always be eager for a Celtic fan or fans to remain as the major powerbrokers.' Lynch, who scored the winner for Celtic against Rangers in the Scottish Cup final in 1977, was devastated when his old club lost to Aberdeen at Hampden in the denouement of that competition last month and failed to complete a world record ninth domestic treble. (Image: SNS Group) However, he believes the Pittodrie club prevailing is healthy for the national game. He would like to see Brendan Rodgers' men face a far sterner challenge next season than they have in the past few years and is convinced it will help them to excel in Europe if they do. 'The game in this country badly needs somebody to come forward and vie with Celtic for major honours,' he said. 'When I played, we would always get a hard game against the likes of St Mirren, Kilmarnock, Motherwell, whoever. It wasn't just Aberdeen, Hearts and Hibs who were difficult to beat. It wasn't like today when Celtic go out and dominate most games. The majority of teams we faced could compete with us and we always had to play at our best. 'I am a Celtic man and I always want them to win. But for me it has become a little bit too easy in recent years. I think having a greater challenge will be good for them and will ultimately help them when they play in Europe. For me, they should always be looking to compete at the highest level, in the very top bracket, on the continent. 'Rangers really need to get their act together. They are in the throes of bringing in another new manager and they have to get their next appointment right. Other clubs need to improve.'
Daily Mail
16 hours ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
RUTH SUNDERLAND: Financial crisis of 2008 still haunts us
The return of NatWest, the bank formerly known as RBS, to the private sector, has more symbolic than practical significance. The sale of the final remnant will not have much impact in the real world of customers, staff and the banking industry more widely. Even so, the final exit of the long-suffering British taxpayer after 17 years – and at a hefty £10billion loss – is a good moment for reflection. Paul Thwaite, the current chief executive, was a relatively junior figure 17 years ago, when the bank came close to going under and taking the entire UK financial system with it. Along with other executives of his generation who began their careers back then, his mindset has been formed by that traumatic experience. Banks, and bankers, are different beasts now. The light touch regulation of the pre-crisis era has been replaced by rules that arguably are too restrictive. There is little trace of the arrogance of former RBS boss Fred Goodwin, Adam Applegarth at Northern Rock and their Wall Street counterparts in the bank CEOs of today. They are considerably more boring – in a good way. The political backdrop is also very different now, though sadly, not necessarily in such a good way. One can trace a line directly from the crisis to the rise of populist leaders on the Left and Right. Disaffection, mistrust and contempt for institutions have become an ingrained feature of the political landscape and this has culminated in the re-election of Donald Trump. In the years running up to 2008, the belief was that capitalism had triumphed over communism with the fall of the Iron and the Bamboo curtains. Globalisation – the free flow of money, trade and people – seemed to be lifting millions of people out of abject poverty. Some communities, including in the rust belt of the US where Trump has won over voters, were being left behind. Cheap credit, including sub-prime mortgages, appeared to be papering over a lot of those cracks. The events of 2008 damaged confidence in experts of all sorts, in elected officials, regulators and institutions. One can draw a line from the debt disasters that hit European nations, including Greece, Spain, Italy and Ireland, to the Brexit referendum. Back in the day, US presidents George W Bush and Barack Obama were at least trying to stabilise the situation rather than throwing petrol on the flames. In the UK, Gordon Brown, a man who may well be judged far more kindly by history than he was at the time, hosted the G20 summit in London in 2009. Many view this gathering, where world leaders pledged to improve financial regulation and to make more than $1trillion available to support the global economy, as a turning point. Central banks flooded economies with emergency cash through Quantitative Easing to keep the system afloat – a necessary measure at the time, though it went on far too long. Wall Street titan Jamie Dimon, then as now the chief executive of JP Morgan, provided a cool head and calm leadership. Dimon, still a towering figure, has been warning Trump about his tariff plans and confrontational foreign agenda. Unfortunately, Trump looks more likely to be the cause of the next crisis than its solution. At the time of the crisis, there were fears the global financial system would implode. That apocalyptic scenario was avoided, but we are still living with the consequences of 2008. Trump is one of them.
Daily Mail
a day ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
I had a ringside seat as arrogant men nearly destroyed a great British bank. That dramatic tale offers a dire warning today: RUTH SUNDERLAND
One Saturday just before Christmas 2007, there was a knock at the Edinburgh home of the late Alistair Darling, who was then Chancellor of the Exchequer in Gordon Brown's Labour Government. On the doorstep, proffering a gift-wrapped panettone, was Fred Goodwin, the boss of Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), who lived nearby. This was no social call: Goodwin had come to beg for help to keep his bank afloat. His visit was Darling's first foreboding of the catastrophe that would engulf RBS a few months later, culminating in a £45 billion taxpayer bailout.
Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Government sells final shares in NatWest 17 years after £45bn bailout
The UK has sold its final shares in NatWest Group, ending 17 years of state ownership since the £45bn taxpayer bailout that saved the bank from collapse at the height of the 2008 financial crisis. The full privatisation of NatWest is a symbolic moment for the banking group – formerly known as Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) – and draws a line under the most tumultuous chapter in its near 300-year history. However, it comes at a £10bn loss to the taxpayer, with the state having only recouped about £35bn of its costs, because its shares have long languished below the average 502p level paid in the bailout. That compares with the £900m profit recouped from the sale of shares in Lloyds Banking Group, which was privatised in 2017, nine years after receiving £20.3bn in state aid for rescuing HBOS during the banking crash. The Treasury said that while it did not recover the entirely of the RBS bailout bill, 'the alternative would have been a collapse with far greater economic costs and social consequences', that could shater confidence in the UK's financial system and put savings and livelihoods at risk. Chancellor Rachel Reeves, said: 'Nearly two decades ago, the then-government stepped in to protect millions of savers and businesses from the consequences of the collapse of RBS.' 'That was the right decision then to secure the economy and NatWest's return to private ownership turns the page on a significant chapter in this country's history. We protected the economy in a time of crisis nearly 17 years ago, now we are focused on securing Britain's future in a new era of global change.' The government has now exited all of the banks it helped bail out during the financial crisis, the Treasury said. RBS became a symbol of the UK banking sector's implosion during the 2008 global financial crisis, with public ire focusing on its aggressive expansion under the former chief executive Fred 'The Shred' Goodwin. Goodwin was stripped of his knighthood in 2012, but is now estimated to be receiving a pension worth nearly £600,000 per year. In 2007 RBS led a consortium to buy the Dutch bank ABN Amro for £49bn – a huge sum at the top of the market. It was then the largest deal in financial services history, and for a short period made RBS the world's biggest bank. With £2.2tn in assets, it was more than double the size of the UK economy. Executives' excessive spending, which extended to private jets and a lavish £350m campus outside Edinburgh, also stretched the bank's finances just as the sector was facing a credit crunch. RBS was eventually forced to take a state bailout in October 2008, with the taxpayer eventually injecting £45bn into the lender, without which millions of customers' savings would have been put at risk. It left the government with an 84% stake in the banking group, leading to years of government austerity that many blame for hollowing out public services across the country. RBS, for its part, was forced to cancel bonuses and begin a long turnaround that involved slashing tens of thousands of jobs, shrinking its investment bank, and pulling out of almost 50 countries to become a UK-focused lender. It finally returned to profit in 2018, but ditched the toxic RBS name in 2020, rebranding the group – and its branches in England and Wales – as NatWest. The government started to recoup its costs through dividends paid out by the lender, and slowly sold its shares through a combination of sales to institutional investors and a drip-feeding of stock into the open market. NatWest also fast-tracked the process through multibillion-pound share buybacks. That process is now completed, bringing NatWest back into full private ownership nearly two decades after taxpayers saved it from the brink. NatWest chief executive, Paul Thwaite, said: 'This is a significant moment for NatWest Group, for all those who work here and for the UK more widely. As we turn the page on the financial crisis, we can look to the future with confidence, without forgetting the lessons of the past.' Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
