Walter Starts the Fight Back - Time for the Fans to Boycott the Lloyds Banking Group?

[Bluedell 5,679]

An article by Contacts on RM, which hopefully he doesn't mind me reproducing.

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If anyone ever doubted how much a Rangers man Walter Smith is then Saturday and the last couple of days again proved beyond doubt his love for the club.

 

For 9 days now our club has been torn to shreds by Donald Muir and Lloyds yet Walter has put the club before himself and brought the subject out in the open when everyone else has been denying it.

 

I have it on very good authority that our club has had a torrid time of since Mr Muir joined the club as director and hatchet man for the bank. His sole remit is to get as much of the bank�s money back as possible. There is a business plan to get the money back but no plan for the short, medium or long term future of the club. Donald Muir�s business plan has shocked everyone connected with the club and although those within have tried to reject his plan he is having none of it.

 

His plan consists of selling at least 5 players in the January transfer window with no replacements other than the young reserve players. He is not offering the management team a new contract and expects them to work on a monthly deal. He is making decisions daily that result in the bank getting as much money out of Rangers Football Club with no care of any knock on effect. He will, of course, tell anyone that listens to him that he is only doing his job but none of that matters to any of us bears.

 

The story in the Herald and the Evening Times are 100% accurate! Please do not doubt what has been written! Please do not doubt that our club was within days of administration! Please do not doubt Lloyds Group do not give a damn about Rangers Football Club!

 

We all have to ask ourselves why Walter would want to make statements on the crisis at our club if he was not deeply concerned. Walter could sit back (like some of the players appear to be doing) and take the money but he is not and his love of the club has got him out fighting.

 

Some may not want to believe this but Martin Bain has been constantly fighting the bank on every decision and defending the club to the hilt but these guys are ruthless.

 

The bank has every intention of getting every penny they can from Rangers and they are happy for Rangers to be operated like a small scale SPL club with no ambition or desire. As well as selling players they want to increase ticket prices and implement huge cost cutting measures across every department.

 

After reading this you would have thought they would happily sell the club at a reduced asking price as they have done with thousands of other businesses during the credit crunch but word has it that they are proving hard to deal with the people who want to invest in the club - or could there be preferred bidders?

 

Now as fans what do we do? Obviously at first hand our options are limited but say we could get enough fans together who bank with the Lloyds Banking Group and start closing our personal / business accounts and move them elsewhere then surely they would have to sit up and take note that our fans are not going to sit back and let our club be asset stripped.

 

Now I am not yet starting an appeal but I want all Rangers fans who hold an account with the Lloyds group to start looking around to see what other banks are offering. Make the phone call or look online at how easy it is to move banks and change your accounts over.

 

Let�s take it a stage further and suggest that we start to boycott media organisations that take money from the Lloyds group and let us see how they feel when other people get too involved. Let us see the reaction from their top brass when their pathetic bullying of our club backfires on them.

 

Walter has put the club before any personal gain and now it is time for the fans to take stock of the last few days and decide how we as a body of hundreds of thousands decide how we should take this matter further.

[Bluedell 5,679]

This is extremely worrying. It's confirmation of what has been written by the journalists, and looks as if things have definitely taken a turn for the worst.

[Zappa 0]

BD, I find it interesting that today's news includes MIH debt figures as well as something which I didn't know - that Lloyds own an 11.4% share in MIH. If they own such a share in MIH, then surely that points to them also owning a healthy share of Rangers??

[Bluedell 5,679]

A subsidiary of MIH owns 57%

A subsidiary of Murray Sports (MSL) owns 34.4%

 

Murray owns 63.8% of MIH.

Lloyds own 11.4% of MIH.

 

Murray owns 57.1% of MSL

Dave King owns 15.5% of MSL

Lloyds own 8.3% of MSL

 

That works out as Lloyds having an indirect share of 9.4% in the club.

[Zappa 0]

So that means Lloyds have about 3 times the number of RFC shares that King has?

[craig 5,199]

How do you know how many shares King has Shroomz?

 

The detail BD provided tells you what Kind owns in MSL and, indirectly, the club but doesnt state what he owns personally. Am sure it could be found out but I am too lazy !

[Zappa 0]

Just noticed you said 'indirect share', but it's still essentially a share though right?

[Bluedell 5,679]

So that means Lloyds have about 3 times the number of RFC shares that King has?

 

Dave King has an indirect interest of 5.3%.

 

Neither hold any shares directly.

[Zappa 0]

How do you know how many shares King has Shroomz?

 

The detail BD provided tells you what Kind owns in MSL and, indirectly, the club but doesnt state what he owns personally. Am sure it could be found out but I am too lazy !

MHL, a company controlled by David Murray now holds a total of 62,060,479

Ordinary Shares, representing 57.1% of the issued share capital.

 

David Murray has a controlling interest in the ordinary share capital of Murray

Sports Ltd through which he has a further beneficial interest in Rangers of

37,448,489 Ordinary Shares.

 

The total number of shares controlled by David Murray is 99,801,034,

representing 91.8% of the issued share capital.

 

Other directors who have an interest in Murray Sports are J. D. G. Wilson

(62,500 ordinary shares), A. J. Johnston (76,616 ordinary shares) and, as an

authorised representative of Metlika Trading Ltd, a BVI company, D. C. King

(3,064,627 ordinary shares

Look here Craig - http://www.plusmarketsgroup.com/PLUS_news_story.shtml?NewsID=9247&ISIN=GB0007237380/GBX/PLUS-exn

 

And here - http://www.plusmarketsgroup.com/PLUS_news_story.shtml?NewsID=9195&ISIN=GB0007237380/GBX/PLUS-exn

[Bluedell 5,679]

Just noticed you said 'indirect share', but it's still essentially a share though right?

 

No. They hold shares in companies that own shares, but neither own any shares directly and neither own a majority of the shares in the respective companies, so in theory both could find that they had no influence in the club.

 

That's why Murray has been talked about owning (or controlling) 92% of the shares.