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Deleted User YDKXO
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Glyanenko seems kosher in terms of being a man of substance. Anyone know who Volov is?
Fairline Boats purchased
- Thread starter stelican
- Start date
ChrisJefferies
Well-Known Member
Those are the names we've been told, still waiting for confirmation from Karl Gilding, though.
There's a little bit of background on Karl here:
http://www.mby.com/news/fairline-new-head-yacht-sales-45481
ChrisJefferies
Well-Known Member
Okay, we've not got confirmation that an offer has been accepted and the names of the investors, plus a few more details:
http://www.mby.com/news/fairline-sale-planned-russian-investors-50753
It's not 100% yet though, should expect official announcement on Fri/early next week at Dusseldorf.
Shame they couldn't get it done in time for London show...
http://www.mby.com/news/fairline-sale-planned-russian-investors-50753
It's not 100% yet though, should expect official announcement on Fri/early next week at Dusseldorf.
Shame they couldn't get it done in time for London show...
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Deleted User YDKXO
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Wow, £4m. That seems like a lot of money for a company which is in administration. Thats certainly £4m more than Better sold the company for to Wessex albeit with debts attached. No wonder Wessex thought it was worth a punt. Lets hope some of that money finds its way back to unpaid staff and suppliers
Nick_H
Well-Known Member
I doubt they've bought the company though Mike, they've probably bought some assets, or at least I assume so as they formed a newco
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Deleted User YDKXO
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Finger trouble, Nick. I should have said assets not company although the MBY report refers to buying the company. My point really was that had Wessex been able to do what I think their original plan was, which was to prepack the company and sell it on, they would have made a very tidy profit.
Nick_H
Well-Known Member
As details of the transaction haven't been released yet I think MBY are probably using the term company to mean the business, rather than the legal entity. I don't quite follow your point about the profit WB could have made on a pre-pack. They would presumably have had to pay the same £4m or thereabouts for the assets, or are you saying they thought they could buy them for a song? That would require a high degree of incompetence on the part of the administrator.
I've personally never been convinced by the pre-pack theory, as the business doesn't have long term sales contracts that could be adversely affected by an administration, so I think an administrator would always want to test the market.
It's all guesswork though, and who knows their real intent.
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Deleted User YDKXO
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I'm no expert on prepacks myself but I assume that a value for the assets is agreed as part of the prepack otherwise there's no point in doing it. As far as the competence of the administrator goes, they're just interested in discharging their legal duty and maximising their fees. They're not industry experts and they won't really know what a company or its assets are worth, particularly the value of the brand
Nick_H
Well-Known Member
Yes, they agree the price of the assets as part of the pre-pack, but as you say, the administrator is not an industry expert so he will always prefer to sell the assets on the open market so he can't be accused of undervaluing them. To agree a pre-pack, the administrator would need to be convinced that the value of the assets would drop significantly as a result of a normal administration process, and I can't see anything in the Fairline business that would make this the case.
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Deleted User YDKXO
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Again AFAIK the rationale behind a prepack is that the value of the business is more likely to be preserved if the assets are sold back to the previous owner. Whatever the original intentions of WB, the advisors called in by WB in October were prepack specialists so IMHO WB were thinking about a prepack. The only other plausible scenario was that this mysterious Middle Eastern moneyman did exist which I find hard to believe
benjenbav
Well-Known Member
My memory might be playing tricks but as I recall it, WB called in a team to organise a CVA: to persuade the creditors than 10 cents on the dollar was better than nothing at all. This didn't get off the ground because BC called in the administrators who now appear to have sold some assets to someone.
If the reports are correct and a bunch of moneymen are standing behind someone who knows the industry the questions to be asked are not just how deep are their pockets but how far into them they will be prepared to put their hands in order to support the business.
Nick_H
Well-Known Member
I don't think the administrator pays any regard as to what will happen to the ongoing business after the sale, his only duty is to maximise the return to the creditors of the insolvent company, which invariably means maximising the sale value of the assets (assuming it can't be sold as a going concern). If he thinks he can get best value by agreeing a pre-pack, either to a connected party or an unrelated third party, then he will agree to the pre-pack. I suppose he may be happy to agree without exposing the assets to the open market if they can be objectively valued, but I'd have thought it's virtually impossible to objectively value a luxury yachts brand name, hull moulds etc, so I doubt an administrator would ever have agreed to a pre-pack, although of course that doesn't mean to say that WB did not intend to try!
I don't know any of this as fact, but it's certainly the way it was explained to me in casual conversation with an administrator recently. Happy to be corrected if anyone knows the precise legal position.
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Deleted User YDKXO
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Nick I'm not sufficiently knowledgeable to continue this conversation but I look at the evidence. WB buy Fairline and immediately start making redundancies and stopping payments to pensions and suppliers. The promise of a mysterious overseas investor fails to materialise. Then they call in administration advisors who happen to be experts in prepack administrations. Whether they planned for a prepack or not, to me that doesn't look like WB had any plans to run Fairline as a going concern, simply to strip out the assets free of any debts. The only fly in their particular ointment was that Better stopped them doing that by calling in their own administratorsI don't think the administrator pays any regard as to what will happen to the ongoing business after the sale, his only duty is to maximise the return to the creditors of the insolvent company, which invariably means maximising the sale value of the assets (assuming it can't be sold as a going concern). If he thinks he can get best value by agreeing a pre-pack, either to a connected party or an unrelated third party, then he will agree to the pre-pack. I suppose he may be happy to agree without exposing the assets to the open market if they can be objectively valued, but I'd have thought it's virtually impossible to objectively value a luxury yachts brand name, hull moulds etc, so I doubt an administrator would ever have agreed to a pre-pack, although of course that doesn't mean to say that WB did not intend to try!
I don't know any of this as fact, but it's certainly the way it was explained to me in casual conversation with an administrator recently. Happy to be corrected if anyone knows the precise legal position.
Anyway its all water under the bridge and here's hoping Fairline's potential new owners have more positive plans for the company
benjenbav
Well-Known Member
I don't think the administrator pays any regard as to what will happen to the ongoing business after the sale, his only duty is to maximise the return to the creditors of the insolvent company, which invariably means maximising the sale value of the assets (assuming it can't be sold as a going concern). If he thinks he can get best value by agreeing a pre-pack, either to a connected party or an unrelated third party, then he will agree to the pre-pack. I suppose he may be happy to agree without exposing the assets to the open market if they can be objectively valued, but I'd have thought it's virtually impossible to objectively value a luxury yachts brand name, hull moulds etc, so I doubt an administrator would ever have agreed to a pre-pack, although of course that doesn't mean to say that WB did not intend to try!
I don't know any of this as fact, but it's certainly the way it was explained to me in casual conversation with an administrator recently. Happy to be corrected if anyone knows the precise legal position.
A new code of practice (SIP 16) was introduced in November 2015 to try to address the perceived lack of transparency in pre-pack administrations.
davidej
Well-Known Member
I don't know much about this but enough to know that pre-pack are almost always rip-off, just the right side of legality to avoid being an outright fraud.
A good idea exploited by the clever/unscrupulous.
And this is from an ex-investment banker - not a Corbynista
Flavio
New Member
petem
Well-Known Member
Both Russian Investors are passionate boat owners. How refreshing to hear that.
Slightly concerning that only 100 employees are being taken back on but its a start. The article also mentions completion of WIP boats. I thought they had all been completed?
Will existing creditors be paid or will this be a fresh start?
Slightly concerning that only 100 employees are being taken back on but its a start. The article also mentions completion of WIP boats. I thought they had all been completed?
Will existing creditors be paid or will this be a fresh start?
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wakeup
Well-Known Member
Probably they bought the assets. The administrator will then distribute the cash available according to ranking to the secured and then non secured etc etc. So they might some monies back.
petem
Well-Known Member
Thanks. I assume that WB only see some cash once all the creditors have been paid?
wakeup
Well-Known Member
Yes, although unlikely, there are better experienced people on here that can comment than me. I understand that Better Capital had a floating charge over the business and that is why they called in the administrator to stop WB restructuring under a pre-pac which could have left BC out of pocket. So you will probably find that BC will get their £2m or so out (to cover the debt relating to the sale of Fairline to WB) and the rest will be spread around so to speak.
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