Football stuff

Stevo_666

rick_chasey said:

kingstongraham said:

If he was going to ever make Chelsea repay the loans, that could be money laundering I suppose.

Loads of ways to launder money. You can buy the club, invest in various things to inflate the value (via your stolen money) and then sell a portion of it to a tax haven company (that you own) or take out loans against it, if you so wish.

You can launder it through ticket sales. You can sell say, 1000 fewer tickets than you have capacity for, claim all the tickets were sold and use the stolen money to buy those remaining 1000 tickets.

With rival murky clubs you can buy and sell players at inflated prices. "agent fees" which go to tax havens with secrecy laws where it's not obvious who is the money is going to, or you can have weird player ownership rights which essentially help to siphon money into different pots.

Then there's the gambling side.

Loads of ways to do it.

Nice lot of possible scenarios. Unfortunately we need facts.

However, regardless of what he has done, his assets have been frozen anyway.

MattFalle

I love it when Rick gets wound up on threads like this. its mega funny.

kingstongraham

I enjoyed the BBC sounds program "the trillion dollar conman". About the story behind Notts County getting Sven and Sol.

TheBigBean

rick_chasey said:

Again BB, I think you are not seeing the wood for the trees.

Just pointing out where you were talking nonsense.

surrey_commuter

For anybody doubting the murkiness of football finance about 25 yrs ago I worked with a bloke whose brother bought Gillingham FC. I enquired if it was a family passion and he said no his acct told him to do it.

MattFalle

surrey_commuter said:

For anybody doubting the murkiness of football finance about 25 yrs ago I worked with a bloke whose brother bought Gillingham FC. I enquired if it was a family passion and he said no his acct told him to do it.

well thats really murkiness is it - its just tax planning.

Dorset_Boy

shirley_basso said:

Also you don't need to make a profit to launder money. you just need to show provenance of cash. Profit would be stupid anyway as you'll pay tax on it.

Profit is vanity etc. Hence the loans (cash) and losses (tax efficient).

Of course you don't need to make a profit to launder money, and buying something at £x and selling it shortly after at a lower figure sounds alarm bells. So serially buying and selling clubs in that manner would raise concerns. You wouldn't however launder in something that makes a constant loss than you aren't selling.

The Gillingham FC example was almost certainly trying to have some losses to offset against other profits.

Not many make money owning sports clubs, and that is the tree where Rick is barking.

There are undoubtedly many dodgy practices around transfers.

briantrumpet

Could make life a bit trickier...

https://twitter.com/SkyNewsBreak/status/1502347964261539841

skyblueamateur

kingstongraham said:

I enjoyed the BBC sounds program "the trillion dollar conman". About the story behind Notts County getting Sven and Sol.

Brilliant podcast

rick_chasey

Ben6899

surrey_commuter said:

seems a lot of confusion between the legals and the morals. It was perfectly legal for Ken Bates to sell Chelsea FC to RA and the FA did their due diligence and confirmed him as a fit and proper person to own it.

Strikes me that somebody could be given the keys in exchange for clearing the debts off. Chelsea will become more Spursy and most of the fans will look back fondly at the golden era and the jonny come lately glory hunters can fvck back to where they came from

Proper due diligence (ie not influenced by brown envelopes) would have found RA as unfit for ownership.

Ben6899

I don't know anything - really - about money laundering, but it does strike me as missing the elephant in the room with all of the "that's not how you launder money" observations.

RA has unimaginable wealth; he's not some fella selling vast amounts of Class As and washing the proceeds through an ice cream shop - he bought a significant portion of a nation's wealth, at discount. I mean, the numbers are huge, who's to say playing the long game and owning a football club for 20years isn't the best way to do it in this case?

Dorset_Boy

Ben: Some on here do know quite a bit about money laundering and get tested on it each year.

Ben6899

Dorset_Boy said:

Ben: Some on here do know quite a bit about money laundering and get tested on it each year.

So teach us. Rather than just telling Rick he's wrong because it doesn't seem the best way to launder; explain to us why it absolutely isn't.

Please. Unless I missed it?

Not looking for a fight here, don't have the energy tbh, but if we were discussing something around engineering, I like to think I'd be a bit more helpful!

shirley_basso

I get tested on it each year and I think owning a football club makes a lot of sense.

Ben6899

Waters ---> muddied

TheBigBean

Ben6899 said:

Dorset_Boy said:

Ben: Some on here do know quite a bit about money laundering and get tested on it each year.

So teach us. Rather than just telling Rick he's wrong because it doesn't seem the best way to launder; explain to us why it absolutely isn't.

Please. Unless I missed it?

Not looking for a fight here, don't have the energy tbh, but if we were discussing something around engineering, I like to think I'd be a bit more helpful!

To launder money you need to get it back somehow, so for example, he could invest money in Chelsea and then award a catering contract to a company he owns. The dirty money going into Chelsea would then become clean money when it arrives in the catering company.

The problem is that most of Chelsea's money goes on players, fees or agents and it is tricky for him to have a legitimate interest in any of those, and an illegitimate interest doesn't help the laundering process.

Furthermore, any money that goes through any UK bank is going to be thoroughly scrutinised, so when he invests money in Chelsea, its source will be considered.

In comparison, when you buy property, the money used is never in a UK bank account under the buyer's name, so it attracts very little attention.

Finally, being own by Abramovich will have attracted a lot of attention, so Chelsea FC Plc would be a really strange place to try to launder money.

Therefore, I would assume that Chelsea was bought and funded with money sufficiently laundered to pass KYC checks.

Ben6899

I see. Thank you.

shirley_basso

But then he can legitimately put more money in / take other money out?

Plus - given the sources of funds (acquiring russian state assets at a discount, and then selling back at inflated prices) then it's a lot of money to take out of Russia.

Given that Russians are involved everywhere there are large sums of money changing hands for influence in London, and the location of CFC, I wouldn't be so confident in assuming that it's not a a money laundering vehicle.

Also - I don't really think KYC checks stand up to a lot of scrutiny - although in this case I appreciate someone senior may have signed off, but that doesn't help when the gov't are currently overruling Mi6 advice.

MattFalle

tbf, when you are as rich as him he could well have just bought Chelsea as a plaything.

same principle as us and n+1, that level of wealth is yacht +1, private island +1, football club.

also nice way to integrate with the landed wealthy in that part of London, political influence and free tickets for your mates.

MidlandsGrimpeur2

I am not in any way suggesting this has been done, but theoretically....

You pump 'dirty' money into a club; buying players, agents fees, stadium improvements etc. You own the club, it is money from your own pocket, nobody questions where it has come from.

This investment brings lots of trophies, which in turn leads to increased revenue through tv rights, merchandise etc. (which is now 'clean' money). Your original investment in the club has now increased hugely. As the largest stakeholder you enjoy the benefit of the profits and when time comes to sell you have a buyer who pays you even more 'clean' money.

Of course, this is just an entirely theoretical means of money laundering, I have no proof that any club anywhere in the world has been subject to such a process....

shirley_basso

I think it was also a good way to get the money he stole from the Russian Government out of Russia and with no way of really getting their hands on it.

TheBigBean

MidlandsGrimpeur2 said:

I am not in any way suggesting this has been done, but theoretically....

You pump 'dirty' money into a club; buying players, agents fees, stadium improvements etc. You own the club, it is money from your own pocket, nobody questions where it has come from.

This investment brings lots of trophies, which in turn leads to increased revenue through tv rights, merchandise etc. (which is now 'clean' money). Your original investment in the club has now increased hugely. As the largest stakeholder you enjoy the benefit of the profits and when time comes to sell you have a buyer who pays you even more 'clean' money.

Of course, this is just an entirely theoretical means of money laundering, I have no proof that any club anywhere in the world has been subject to such a process....

Chelsea don't make a profit though. If he received the proceeds of a sale, it would become legitimate money though.

shirley_basso

Because of the cost of the loans, right? Who made the loans to Chelsea?

TheBigBean

shirley_basso said:

Because of the cost of the loans, right? Who made the loans to Chelsea?

Think of it purely in cash. Has cash ever gone from Chelsea to Abramovich and if so did this exceed his investment.

Football clubs don't really make money.

pblakeney

TheBigBean said:

shirley_basso said:

Because of the cost of the loans, right? Who made the loans to Chelsea?

Think of it purely in cash. Has cash ever gone from Chelsea to Abramovich and if so did this exceed his investment.

Football clubs don't really make money.

Do they have to? I'm basing purely on movies so probably way off mark.
Getting 60-80% clean back is normally in the ballpark.

Dorset_Boy

MidlandsGrimpeur2 said:

I am not in any way suggesting this has been done, but theoretically....

You pump 'dirty' money into a club; buying players, agents fees, stadium improvements etc. You own the club, it is money from your own pocket, nobody questions where it has come from.

This investment brings lots of trophies, which in turn leads to increased revenue through tv rights, merchandise etc. (which is now 'clean' money). Your original investment in the club has now increased hugely. As the largest stakeholder you enjoy the benefit of the profits and when time comes to sell you have a buyer who pays you even more 'clean' money.

Of course, this is just an entirely theoretical means of money laundering, I have no proof that any club anywhere in the world has been subject to such a process....

Problem there is that Chelsea (as with most sporting clubs) are not profitable. I posted up thread their annnual losses.
Whilst a launderer is willing to accept a loss on an investment as part of trying to 'clean' the money, it doesn't make sense to fund losses over a 20 year period.
It just doesn't fit the MO of someone trying to launder substantial sums.

A launderer would be willing to buy a property and then sell it on one or two years later, whether at a profit or a loss.
A launderer would be willing to purchase a conventional investment and sell out a short time later whether at a profit or a loss.
What they don't do is fund losses year in, year out for the best part of 20 years and only 'choose' to sell the asset when forced to do so.

kingstonian

TheBigBean said:

shirley_basso said:

Because of the cost of the loans, right? Who made the loans to Chelsea?

Think of it purely in cash. Has cash ever gone from Chelsea to Abramovich and if so did this exceed his investment.

Football clubs don't really make money.

You’re right, they don’t, but for the top clubs in the PL the club valuation goes up.

Somewhere either in this or another thread I posted that when he bought the club there was a general belief it was partly because he wanted a plaything and partly because it was a high profile asset outside of Russia that Putin couldn’t seize if their relationship ever turned nasty (as it had with other oligarchs). He bought the club as a hobby, paid a pittance for it, pumped cash into it (we pump a lot of money into our cycling hobbies, he is doing just that but on a whole different scale) and a large loan, and probably expected at some point in the future to sell the club, having had loadsa fun with it, for a decent profit. He (and we) didn’t consider the UK government seizing it off him which has screwed up those plans.

MidlandsGrimpeur2

It just doesn't fit the MO of someone trying to launder substantial sums.

Fair point and I do agree with you and BigBean about the lack of profit and short term gains. I do think there is something in the idea raised about long term value though as per Kingstonian's post above.

shirley_basso

It's also placed him into a position of influence and provided fame and allowed him to rub shoulders with people who won't pull an AK-47 on him at a moment's notice - so not a bad investment all round.