Tony Xia (no longer involved with AVFC)

[allani]

41 minutes ago, peterms said:

Yes.

The Chinese connection introduces two other uncertainties.  One is that there's reportedly a lot of dodgy loans being made in China at the moment, often circumventing attempts to rein in the amount of lending that's going on.  Lots of articles appearing in recent months, expressing concern about impending trouble because of this, with many people standing to lose.  The other is the role of the Chinese government in encouraging purchases of foreign clubs.  I've no idea whether either of those things has any bearing on our financial arrangements.  Some openness and transparency about where the money is coming from would be welcome.  I won't hold my breath.

I'm not convinced that China is necessarily any worse than anywhere else.  The US have a pretty poor track record when it comes to dodgy loans and the transparency and openness of the financial affairs of the two Presidential candidates leaves a lot to be desired.  If they aren't obligated to be more open and honest whilst running for one of the most influential roles on the planet then we'll struggle for anyone else too.  And it is only ever possible to follow a paper trail so far.  If we got all the info about the direct money sources / investments would that really prove anything?  Either it shows that the money appears to be "clean" or it doesn't - in which case our owners would be shown to be both bent and stupid.  It won't stop any conspiracy theories and it won't prove 100% that everything is completely above board either.

PS - Just for the record that isn't me stating that we shouldn't be aiming for open & transparent!!!!

Edited October 6, 2016 by allani

[VillaChris]

16 hours ago, dont_do_it_doug. said:

Talking about somebody asking to see the manager shortlist...

Some people were worried he wouldn't learn from his mistakes. 

Turns out he's quite a fast learner. 

This is part of the reason I'm a bit uncomfortable with him being so proactive on Twitter....a fan actually asking him to see the managerial shortlist he's drawn up. a) the guy is a complete and utter moron and  most of the predicted names in the list were in a few of the papers.

[Vive_La_Villa]

2 hours ago, markavfc40 said:

You raise a good point here and it may be one that many of us have chosen to turn a blind eye to. We don’t know do we and we won’t know perhaps until the clubs accounts come out.

Fans of clubs are pretty superficial really. Owner is spending a few quid, saying the right things, and we trust them all the time perhaps blissfully unaware that there is a huge shit storm potentially further along the road.

There is still plenty we don’t know about Xia.

True but no point worrying about unknowns. I don't think fans turn a blind eye they just have no real reason to doubt him yet. 

[Vive_La_Villa]

1 hour ago, peterms said:

Yes.

The Chinese connection introduces two other uncertainties.  One is that there's reportedly a lot of dodgy loans being made in China at the moment, often circumventing attempts to rein in the amount of lending that's going on.  Lots of articles appearing in recent months, expressing concern about impending trouble because of this, with many people standing to lose.  The other is the role of the Chinese government in encouraging purchases of foreign clubs.  I've no idea whether either of those things has any bearing on our financial arrangements.  Some openness and transparency about where the money is coming from would be welcome.  I won't hold my breath.

With all due respect why do you want to know and why would it be your concern?  Would transparency on funds affect your support of the club?

edit: I wonder if Chelsea fans would like to know where the owners funds came from. 

Edited October 6, 2016 by Vive_La_Villa

[peterms]

1 hour ago, allani said:

I'm not convinced that China is necessarily any worse than anywhere else.  The US have a pretty poor track record when it comes to dodgy loans and the transparency and openness of the financial affairs of the two Presidential candidates leaves a lot to be desired.  If they aren't obligated to be more open and honest whilst running for one of the most influential roles on the planet then we'll struggle for anyone else too.  And it is only ever possible to follow a paper trail so far.  If we got all the info about the direct money sources / investments would that really prove anything?  Either it shows that the money appears to be "clean" or it doesn't - in which case our owners would be shown to be both bent and stupid.  It won't stop any conspiracy theories and it won't prove 100% that everything is completely above board either.

PS - Just for the record that isn't me stating that we shouldn't be aiming for open & transparent!!!!

Yes, I agree there's a lack of transparency in lots of places.  But simply being told whether the money is coming from Xia's own pocket or if the club is being pushed into big debts would be helpful.

[Vive_La_Villa]

1 minute ago, peterms said:

Yes, I agree there's a lack of transparency in lots of places.  But simply being told whether the money is coming from Xia's own pocket or if the club is being pushed into big debts would be helpful.

Helpful how mate? I'm trying to understand why you'd want to know? 

[markavfc40]

9 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

True but no point worrying about unknowns. I don't think fans turn a blind eye they just have no real reason to doubt him yet. 

I don’t mean he has done anything wrong and we are turning a blind eye to it. Far from it. I simply mean we don’t know if the money has come from his personal wealth or if he has/is borrowing money against the club and loading us with debt. In that regard many of us have turned a blind eye to the fact we don’t know.

In fairness unless things go completely tits up and we do end up in a load of debt then I doubt any of us will really care, or care to find out, where the money has come from.

[Vive_La_Villa]

1 minute ago, markavfc40 said:

I don’t mean he has done anything wrong and we are turning a blind eye to it. Far from it. I simply mean we don’t know if the money has come from his personal wealth or if he has/is borrowing money against the club and loading us with debt. In that regard many of us have turned a blind eye to the fact we don’t know.

In fairness unless things go completely tits up and we do end up in a load of debt then I doubt any of us will really care, or care to find out, where the money has come from.

Fair enough mate. I'm just trying to understand in general why fans would even want to know if the club was being riddled with debt. I mean bar boycotting matches, what can we do? As a fan with no power I'd prefer not to not know the truth. 

[BOF]

7 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

Helpful how mate? I'm trying to understand why you'd want to know? 

I think what Peter has been getting it is that transparency would reassure him that there will BE a club in 10 years time Or at least not one that went down the Portsmouth route.

[peterms]

3 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

With all due respect why do you want to know and why would it be your concern?  Would transparency on funds affect your support of the club?

I think all fans would be concerned if we were the subject of some of the monkey business that goes on.  There's a very big difference between someone who is putting their own wealth into the club out of interest and commitment, and someone who is loading unsustainable debts onto it for their own gain.  Lots of people seem to be assuming that Xia is some kind of sugar daddy who is doing this for our benefit, and I can't understand why there seems to be so little interest in understanding what the position actually is.

I'm especially interested given the involvement of Samuelson, who was behind the mess at Reading.

Quote

Samuelson arrived at Madejski Stadium in 2012 and initially was the public face of Anton Zingarevich’s Thames Sport Investment company.

Once TSI’s takeover was complete, Samuelson took up a position on the board at Reading, along with Andrew Obolensky.

Both then left the board in June 2014 after Zingarevich had disappeared, leaving the club in the midst of a perilous financial crisis.

 

Samuelson was a board member of Recon, though Xia had claimed that he never had any connection with the company.

Doesn't the involvement of someone like that, and being lied to about it, make you at least a little wary?

[Vive_La_Villa]

1 minute ago, BOF said:

I think what Peter has been getting it is that transparency would reassure him that there will BE a club in 10 years time Or at least not one that went down the Portsmouth route.

If that is going to happen and you have no power to stop this would you want to know? 10 years of worry. Forget that!!

ignorance is bliss

[BOF]

Just now, Vive_La_Villa said:

If that is going to happen and you have no power to stop this would you want to know? 10 years of worry. Forget that!!

ignorance is bliss

Don't underestimate fan power

[Vive_La_Villa]

1 minute ago, peterms said:

I think all fans would be concerned if we were the subject of some of the monkey business that goes on.  There's a very big difference between someone who is putting their own wealth into the club out of interest and commitment, and someone who is loading unsustainable debts onto it for their own gain.  Lots of people seem to be assuming that Xia is some kind of sugar daddy who is doing this for our benefit, and I can't understand why there seems to be so little interest in understanding what the position actually is.

I'm especially interested given the involvement of Samuelson, who was behind the mess at Reading.

Samuelson was a board member of Recon, though Xia had claimed that he never had any connection with the company.

Doesn't the involvement of someone like that, and being lied to about it, make you at least a little wary?

It totally get where you are coming from mate and tbh there are reasons to be wary. I'm just not sure what we could ever do once we knew the truth. 

[peterms]

16 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

It totally get where you are coming from mate and tbh there are reasons to be wary. I'm just not sure what we could ever do once we knew the truth. 

Well, fans at Reading, Portsmouth and other places became much more interested in lobbying for fan ownership when the shit hit the, er, fans.

I imagine most people would rather know sooner than later if a club is drifting into a problem.  What could be done about it would depend on the scale of the problem, but if any problems only become apparent very late in the day, then it's too late to do anything.  But that's a general principle behind expecting some openness about any organisation, isn't it, whether it takes the form of audited accounts or publicly accountable regulation?

[bannedfromHandV]

I wonder for how long the name Samuelson will appear in this thread.

Aside from being involved somehow with Reading I still don't know or care as to who he is.

[dont_do_it_doug.]

Well, there will be accounts no?

There's nothing you can realistically do about it till then. A few investigative journalists had a go and came up with nothing. So best to wait and see. 

Or fly out to China and have a crack yourself. Whatever floats your boat. 

[dn1982]

Are people still questioning Dr Xia? Time and again he's set out his vision for the club. Only this week Keith Wyness reiterated it again. We want a model that spans the globe like Man City and that's how we will grow our revenue. If the club is being saddled with debt which Xia has denied it'll come out in accounts soon enough. Abramovich has saddled CFC with loads of debt and could call it in at any time if he wanted too.  Lerner wrote off loads of debt. Why aren't these type of owners scrutinised as much? China is still is a very secretive country. Something along the lines of how Russia was when Roman started earning his money. The Dr passed all the checks. Our wage bill is reportedly down to 35m a year. Even though we spent heavily in the summer most should be covered by parachute payments. So far the Dr has been a breath of fresh air if a little eccentric. He now has a big decision to make regarding the manager. It seems he will listen to experts and not fans. He is learning about being an owner and seems to be learning fast. There's nothing to question yet. 

[mjmooney]

I think Dr. Xia is currently learning that great truism: 

By buying a football club, you can end up sitting on a small fortune. 

Providing you start with a large fortune. 

[VillaChris]

He did claim on twitter a few weeks back we hadn't spent a penny of our parachute payments on transfers yet.

He's pretty loaded I reckon.

[AntrimBlack]

1 hour ago, BOF said:

I think what Peter has been getting it is that transparency would reassure him that there will BE a club in 10 years time Or at least not one that went down the Portsmouth route.

It depends on what transparency shows.

It might stir up a storm of anxiety.