Ecclestone Wants 100 Mill for QPR...Briatore Buy?

Remembering what was paid for the club...and the club is deep in debt...and the stadium in effect owned by others....

The Guardian

F1's Bernie Ecclestone may sell shareholding in QPR for £100m• Flavio Briatore has first option on any sale by Ecclestone
• Bahrain Grand Prix faces opposition to rescheduling

Giles Richards

Bernie Ecclestone has said he may be willing to sell his stake in Queens Park Rangers for £100m, with the club requiring just one point to secure promotion to the Premier League. However, as with so many of the Formula One ringmaster's business deals, it would not be entirely straightforward since the ex-Renault team chief and previous QPR owner Flavio Briatore would have first option on any sale.Ecclestone, who purchased the majority shareholding of 62% from Briatore in December of last year, said: "If somebody bought that team today it would be a very good punt. It is probably worth £100m." But he also noted that a change of ownership would still be in Briatore's hands: "I don't have any choice staying in or going out," he said. "Flavio would probably be the one to sell if anybody … It is dependent on Flavio."

The club, which has made a loss in the past two years (£18.8m in 2008-09 and £13.7m last year), is still clearly seen by Ecclestone as a good potential investment: "You see a lot of these clubs today that are nowhere as high in the league as we are, playing people that have fallen from the top and beating them so there is no need to spend these fortunes," he said.

In March it was reported that a group of American and Asian businessmen were interested in buying Ecclestone's shares, while in October of last year, F1 team Force India's owner, Vijay Mallya, was linked with an attempted purchase. The club has issued a statement which says it "has entered into preliminary discussions, which may or may not result in an offer being made."

Over the weekend Ecclestone commented on a potential buy-out of Formula One by a consortium that would include Rupert Murdoch's News Corp and the Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim, who is currently a backer of the Sauber team. He noted that his future within the sport may depend on any new owners: "I'm old enough to get a pension, so I don't have to get a job. I'd have to be sure the people [who end up owning F1] are people I would like to work with and whether they would want to work with me."

The majority shareholding in Formula One is currently held by private equity firm CVC Capital, of which Ecclestone owns an unknown number of shares. However his central position within F1 suggests that it is highly unlikely he would, in fact, step away from the sport.

Meanwhile, organisers of the Bahrain grand prix, scheduled to hold the season's opening race which was cancelled due to the civil unrest occurring in the country, are due to inform the FIA this Sunday whether they want it to be reinstated on the calendar. However they are facing dissent from a group of activists who do not want the race to go ahead under the current circumstances.

The group known as the "Youth of the 14 February Revolution" have published an open letter to Ecclestone as part of a Facebook campaign. We "are asking you to consider the challenges to organise what should be a happy sporting event in the middle of a country under siege and martial law, surrounded by tanks and military forces, while the population is being reduce to silence, killed, tortured, etc ..." said the letter.

It continued: "In support of the population of Bahrain, we're asking you to reconsider hosting the grand prix of Bahrain until basic human rights and freedom are restored …" Before concluding: "We thank you very much for your support and wish to see the grand prix in Bahrain soon, in a free and democratic atmosphere to which you would have contributed."

Both Ecclestone and the Formula One teams have made little comment on the fate of the grand prix, awaiting the decision on whether the country believes it can host the race, before addressing the logistics of when it might be held.

There is a three-week break in the F1 season scheduled for August, during which the average temperature in Bahrain is 38c. However Ecclestone has previously said this should not be an impediment: "If the Crown Prince is of the opinion that his country is able to host a race we will return to Bahrain. I think the teams are sensible enough even to race in Bahrain in the summer break, and despite high temperatures, because this is the way we can support the country," he said.

In a packed season, already hosting 19 races, the most realistic alternative to the mid-summer break is for the race to be held on the weekend between the Abu Dhabi grand prix on 13 November and the season finale in Brazil on 27 November.


www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/apr/26/formula-one-bernie-ecclestone-qpr

Don't quite understand the Flavio thing

I'd have to check back to the exact reported sale price...when Caliendo/Paladini et al sold to Briatore et al..

And when Paladini bought out Jones and BP and Blackburn et al...

And on...


But if take what has been spent by Briatore/Ecclestone et al...
The losses we've made (owed by the club, not by them)
The mortgaging of the stadium now owned seperately...

Not sure how/why we became a hundred million pound club...
And who would get this money?
And what the debts would be?

Or would it just be another massive debt owed by the club - as was the case when Man Ut were bought by Glaziers. So without assets, we'd be paying off the interest on a hundred million pound debt instead of the infamours 10 million pound ABC Loan

This is a case for Ingham...
And QPR Dad could maybe explain finances a little bit more