? Vladimir Antonov resigns as club chairman
? 'The club has funding in place for the short term'
Portsmouth Football Club have been plunged into renewed crisis after the company which owns the club, Convers Sports Initiatives, 80% owned by Vladimir Antonov, who has been arrested for alleged bank fraud, was placed into administration. Antonov, wanted for questioning in Lithuania, has resigned as the chairman and director of the club.
A statement by CSI said Andrew Andronikou and Peter Kubik of the accountants Hacker Young, who handled Portsmouth's �120m insolvency last year, when Pompey became the first Premier League club to go into administration, have been appointed to handle the CSI collapse. The Football League said its board will decide whether Portsmouth should be deducted 10 points "when all the facst become available".
The intention, formed during frantic recent days at Fratton Park, is to try to keep Portsmouth solvent this time, and for the administrators to sell the club quickly as a going concern. CSI, with Antonov's money, has recently bought nine sporting entities, including Portsmouth, Power Play Golf and the Leaders in Football conference event, and Kubik said: "We were appointed after uncertainty arose over the future of CSI. CSI has a number of sports related assets and we are very confident of finding interested buyers for these subsidiaries."
For Portsmouth to avoid going into administration a second time so soon after coming out of the last one they must not be sucked into the storm enveloping Antonov. He was arrested by City of London police following the issue of the European warrant on 23 November, appeared at Westminster magistrates' court where he was granted bail, and faces a hearing on 16 December which will decide whether he is to be extradited to Lithuania.
The Lithuanian prosecutor-general's investigation focuses on the country's Snoras Bank, of which Antonov was a major shareholder and Raimondas Baranauskas the chairman. "Both former managers of the bank Snoras have been recognised as suspects with regard to misappropriation of property on a large scale and forgery of documents," the prosecutor-general's office said.
That followed a previous announcement on 17 November that the Lithuanian authorities were investigating "allegations of fraudulent accounting, forgery of documents, abuse of authority, misappropriation of property and money-laundering" at Snoras Bank. Antonov and Baranauskas both deny wrongdoing and are expected to contest extradition.
In response on 17 November, CSI, 80% owned by Antonov, 15% by a Hungarian sports executive Roman Dubov and 5% by Chris Akers, an English sports entrepreneur, issued a statement of its own, saying it wanted to "reassure its companies, staff and the fans ? that it remains very much business as usual".
It said CSI was secure because it had been "solely financed through the private wealth of its owners" ? largely Antonov, and not by or with loans from the Snoras Bank. However, that attempt to hold back the tide belied a recognition by Dubov Akers and senior staff at Fratton Park, including the chief executive David Lampitt, realised that the position was very serious. No further public statements were made until the sudden appointment of administrators to CSI. Akers told the Guardian that Antonov has invested around �10.5m into Portsmouth to pay for transfer fees and underwrite players' wages since CSI bought the club from the previous owner, the Hong Kong-based businessman, Balram Chainrai, in June.
Akers said the club were relying on Antonov for continued funding, which includes paying 20p in the pound over the next five years to creditors who lost up to �80m in the club's administration. Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs claim to be owed �37m in unpaid tax and VAT, and is challenging in the high court the league's "football creditors rule", which sees clubs and players required to be paid in full when a club exits administration while tax and other creditors must accept a fraction of their losses.
Chainrai himself loaned �17m to Portsmouth, then put the club into administration, bought it back, then sold it to CSI. CSI is understood to be overdue paying Chainrai instalments, and he registered a mortgage against CSI before the administrators were appointed. That makes Chainrai the early favourite to take the club over, again.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/nov/29/portsmouth-parent-company-administration
No comments:
Post a Comment