In recent weeks, AC Milan owner Gerry Cardinale has travelled to the Middle East alongside CEO Giorgio Furlani, seeking investment into the club to pay the €550million vendor loan owed to Elliott Management before the 2025 deadline.
When RedBird took over Milan from Elliott Management in 2022, half of the €1.2billion fee was paid upfront, with the rest scheduled to be paid through a vendor loan.
Whilst the deadline is not until 2025, Cardinale would prefer to pay that back sooner than then, hence his recent trips to the United States of America and the Middle East to seek investment, given his contacts and relations within both regions.
Repubblica (via RadioRossonera) have written that Cardinale would ideally prefer to have paid the vendor loan back by the end of 2024, with the summer being seen as a reasonable and achievable target. As a result, it would mean that the Elliott group would no longer have any influence in the club.
The newspaper has also stated that a deal is reportedly underway, which only further concretes the suggestions that the loan could be paid off far before the deadline.
What influence is Elliot exerting that it needs to be paid early?
That’s the next question.
They are on the board and can vote on matters influencing direction the club takes.
I am aware. Again, what is Elliot not ok with?
I’m curious to see how much of the club is sold to whatever new investor. For argument’s sake, let’s assume the club is still valued at the purchase price of 1.2bn, that none of the vendor loan has been paid back to date, and that the new investor is expected to pony up the 550m that is the outstanding loan. This would mean that this “minority investor” would own up to 46% of the club. That’s massive.
So, I’m assuming that A. The club’s valuation has risen (my guess is by at least 100m); and B. Some of the vendor loan as been repaid at regular intervals, like most loans. If Redbird closed on the club in Aug 2022, and say the loan matures in Aug 2025, then the formula might be 550m/36 months. Which means 15.28m per month, not including any interest (if there is any). Meaning they’ve already paid 16 months of the loan for 244,480,000, or almost half, leaving 305,520,000 to be repaid . If the club is now valued at 1.3bn, that would make the outstanding 305,520,000 roughly equivalent to 24% of the club, which is actually reasonable for a minority stake in the club.
It’s not a controlling stake and that’s what matters. Gerry won’t give up control. The problem is, no investor giving up that much cash wants a minority stake.
Yeah, and especially for a Serie A club.
*That is if the investment is in the club not Redbird.
Maybe they will. If they like Cardinale’s plan and want to become the majority stakeholder one day, this may be the way to go.
Pretty sure the investment would be in RedBird, not Milan.
the wage and market investment to earnings ratio is clearly one they kept a say in from the business we have been doing.
Definitely possible. The last thing that Elliott would want would be to see Redbird pull a Li, trash the club’s finances again, default on the loan and force Elliott to do it all over again. Elliott does not want to own football clubs.
This why Elliott include in the contract selling a clause meaning that the debt will be on Redbird Side not Ac Milan account
I hope one day they won’t make use of the growth decree, we shouldn’t deprive ourselves from Serie A talent whether italians or foreigns
And it’s also why Redbird may want to repay the loan early, to unshackle itself from those restrictions, which perhaps ought to give some of the Redbird haters hope that they’re looking to increase wage and transfer budgets.
To get rid of the Growth decree’s use
Want to hear another problem Cardinale and his fart sniffers are about to hit? Growth decree extention must be agreed by the end of the year with Italian government. As things stand, it currently looks like it wont be extended. If Lega cannot find agreement with government, it’ll be huge problem for Serie A which is already behind other bug guns in football. It will already impact contract extentions with players who receive wage under growth decree.
If you want less of something, tax it more? Is that how it works? 🤔
I mean, all clubs are going to have to deal with this. It could be a blessing in disguise if it made Italian club realize that there is a ton of talent in Italy. Clubs should start relying more on the talent they develop. When Serie A ruled the world in the 90s, most teams had majority Italian squads. There will be an adjustment period, as the influx of foreign players dries up and teams reorient to more Italian-heavy squads that in the near term will lack some talent due to the lack of opportunities for Italian players at the highest level, but as more Italian players are able to reach that level you will see the quality come back up. Balls are needed to see it through.
Exactly, and maybe we have a bit of advantage over other Serie A clubs with really talented Primavera generation and younger selections. It’ll take time but surely Serie A must start working on their youngsters. Problem is, other European big guns from other leagues will have huge advantage on European stage. Many will also leave Serie A due to weak competitivness and wage budget. It will be a huge blow to Serie A in terms of revenue where they’re already trailing behind others.
Juventus & Atalanta Bergame are more equipped, beacause they already created U23, having your kids play in Serie C, make their development fast as you depicted in their respective line up & substitute players between 18-23 years old,
We are still slowing down the process, to be honest nothing has been done, all the odds are against it.
Conclusion: It’s true among the youth sector some player are interesting, but how many of them will live up to our expectations, it’s not ruled out they will end up in other clubs Such LOCATELLI-DONARUMMA-BELLANOVA
Perfect, f**i*g, fed up hearing growth decree, wanna see itlaian talent in Rossonero
Me also.
The vendor loan (by Elliott) is interest only at7% per annum. No principal amortisation and therefore loan will be repaid in full at the end of the term.
We have seen this before. Redbird will be out. Either Elliot, or the Arabs will have control. But without a stadium, and naming rights, and a better revenue stream, any Serie A club is a losing investment.
Broke guy bought Milan because the seller gave him a loan, now he is looking for other people’s money to pay the loan? Nice. Nothing is sweeter than spending other people’s money!!
Let’s hope whoever decides to buy shares that affect Milan actually has Milan at heart.