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“Nobody robbed the shareholders. People were warned on this board for months. A lack of understanding about valuation, debt, directors' duties and restructuring processes does not mean you were robbed.”
If people are warned on a random internet board that they are about to be robbed, this doesn’t mean robbery isn’t robbery.
The problem here lies with the directors’ duty. They had a duty to protect shareholders interests and not to lie. Instead, they acted against the interests of shareholders and kept lying for over a year. Read their reports. All they said was that the business is doing well, it is cash generative and has plenty of debt headroom. Suddenly, when they realized MA could try to get control of the company, they discovered that the company is deeply in debt (it was not 6 month ago according to their reports), that the debt problem is urgent despite the bonds maturing after one year, and that a pre-pack should be done faster than a shareholder meeting can be called.
It is lies and robbery all the way. You don’t have to be an accountant, a lawyer or a prosecutor to see robbery for what it is.
@ daniel.f, yes they are robing the shareholders it's very attractive, cash generative, and profitable business, why else would it have bright future?
At a time of suspension it had over 1 billion pound worth of stock, it has over £600mllion worth assets like property and stores it own, and over £200 million worth Nordic business on top of £250million loan they had not used with £60million canceled dividend. All taken for £600million debt.
The question why value recovery for shareholders is nil, and why they don't feel ashamed of saying such a thing.
@alamo55, its showing as UK IP so it's not a foreigner you can always email and ask them.
Someone as gone to trouble of web charges and hosting costs and domain.
The warnings were more like a few weeks - perhaps the last two months - from some posters ... once the RNS landed to say shareholders may be wiped out under some of the options. What were the other options available?
It's all history under the bridge now and no point tbh having arguments here now just for the sake of it - discussion may continue depending on whether MA takes legal action. As for "robbed".. well lets just say the directors could have carried out a rights issue in 2017 or 2018 which may had helped matters. The directors could have stopped dividends sooner. Could have carried out a CVA sooner etc etc. So maybe not "robbed" but a similar word I feel is valid.. I wonder what word the employees losing their jobs might use?
It to me looks as if big Mike wasn't loaning out shares to Odey after all and with the amount of the short it looks to me as if it might have been the Landmark Mickey.
daniel.f shareholders including spd were robbed as this company is still operating with a internet sales site and all stores still open. A pre-pack administration was not the only option open here and Mike Ashely should have been given the time stated in the takeover code to make a full bid and his other offers weren't given full or fair consideration. A shareholder is robbed when a bod are economical with truth in their rnses. Cheshire was the only honourable one here and Duddy should stand down immediately. Mike was right lie detector tests should have been taken by the lot of them. I hope other shareholders back Mike in getting the fca to conduct a full investigation and nobody posting on here should be predicting or prejudging what might come of any legal actions raised.
Nobody robbed the shareholders. People were warned on this board for months. A lack of understanding about valuation, debt, directors' duties and restructuring processes does not mean you were robbed.
MA has lost the battle and I’m sure the shareholders who were robbed won’t set foot in any Debs store again and I don’t expect it will survive at the end of the day ,also I still get bombarded with emails with reductions every day the bloody arseholes have a cheek you know.
If I was MA I wouldn't hold out much hope that they'll close down any stores where they share the business with his Harrods on the high street.
D.
The mud thickens.The BOD did act in the last few months against the interest of the shareholders.They announced the closure programme last year but not naming stores.In January they still would not name stores as they were trying to save some ,however their loss last year was due to them writing off assets in advance.They really are a disgrace and I am sure the money they got was for future changes to their structure and they should really be banned from holding office. see they have promoted the Chairman to executive.I hope he does better than the last company he ran which also lost shareholders lots of money
The closure list is on the BBC website :-(
....also quite a few mistakes in the speel, makes you think of a foreign entity trying it on to get a few quid.
The link you quoted doesn't say who is running it, just asking for donations, needs to have more info like where is your money going. Could be another scam?
I like the bit which says Debenhams is an attractive and cash generative business!!.....yeah right!...so much so that they robbed all shareholders to get that cash, scumbags!!
I like the bit which says Debenhams us an attractive and cash generative business!!.....yeah right!...so much so that they robbed all shareholders to get the cash, scumbags!!
Could it reverse back to shareholders? It's 2 billion pound company and whats left after debt goes to shareholders, after stabilizing and restructuring it can go back to a win for everyone.
Oh and found this.
http://www.xdebenhams.com/
Sadly, I think you are right. This is what bad corporate governance and breach of fiduciary duty means. When the BOD acts against the interest of shareholders, only because they don’t like the biggest shareholder. It is a disgrace that something like this is legal, especially when we are talking about a listed company.
I think that any lender would want to be able to operate without the interference of mike ashley as his style is not exactly corporate , so the interests of all other shareholders have been sacrificed to that end imv.
I think bondholders will be on the losing side in the end, because the tier 1 lenders which are in charge now will only look for themselves. They stole from shareholders first, and bondholders were happy because they were spared for now, but they are next on the list. When the direct lenders will need to steal some more, the bondholders will be their next target, as there is nothing left to steal from shareholders.
Thieves don’t care about their victims. They steal as much as they can.
In this case, they wanted to get rid of MA so they can have free hand on how to distribute the spoils of their plunder among themselves.
"Really, the biggest issue to me is why did bondholders want to wipe out the shareholders?"
I doubt that motivated them. They acted in their own interests as they were entitled to in their role as lender; they're probably indifferent to the effects caused for others. They wanted to get their money back and avoid losing more/all of it.
Atb
Really, the biggest issue to me is why did bondholders want to wipe out the shareholders? Most of us were loyal supporters of DEB. And a lot of us were staff / ex staff. Ignoring MA for a moment, I cannot see any point in treating the staff so poorly. They are not exactly well paid as it is, so to have this additionally happen to them is completely unfair. Bondholders need the staff to turn this round. It seems a very shabby way to treat them, and frankly, for the small amount the equity was worth on 9th April of £27m, you wonder if it was worth alienating so many.
I get it that a debt is a debt and the company had a lot of them, but £27m was nothing in all this. And staff should have been provided the ability to gain from the turn around if it comes through. Instead, it is US vulture funds that are going to make a killing. How can this be deemed acceptable?
I think it was that some time ago. But that generation decreases, and to the nascent generation aged 50ish Debenhams is invisible or irrelevant. They have no brand value left and can only compete on price. M&S and John Lewis still retain some identity and therefore value in their respective brands.
Over 50 .. middle England...? So that's a future of 10-20 years but M&S and John Lewis have a similar customer profile.. long term survival means adapting and increasing online sales
MA got outmanoeuvred. Maybe he'll threaten to threaten suing. Whatever plays out legally, if anything, nothing can reverse the equity wipeout for former shareholders. That's done and dusted.
Terry Duddy sums up Sergio's tenure thus: "Debenhams now has a clear path towards a viable and sustainable future and we have Sergio and his team to thank for that,”. Sounds rather pleased at how it turned out. Not even a thought for the investors they trampled to get this wonderful result.
For what it's worth, I don't think DEB can survive long term. I base this on asking myself a simple question: who is Debenhams' customer? There is no obvious answer. For retailers, that's a killer.