Sorry, yes, I forgot to mention that one ! The problem with that scenario is the belief that there would be a second buyer waliting in the wings when we haven't seen one yet. It would make sense if the team could get into the CL, and gain a bigger brand image. Apart from that I'm not sure what other tarting up could be done.
Hedge funds typically make their money from having better information than the rest of the market and thereby making "better" decisions. Because they are smaller than the big city-investors - banks, insurance and pension companies, etc - they are able to focus on sections of the market from which they think a good profit can be made. If they're looking to invest in NUFC then they will have given it serious amounts of thought and must have concluded that they can make money. As you seem to agree, I don't think there's too much scope for them to squeeze more money from trading - tickets, merchandise, etc - in the short-term. There definately is in the long-term, although this will take considerable investment and implementation of an appropriate strategy, not the kind of stuff hedge funds normally get involved in. This is what leads me to believe that they think they'll be able to make some quick money from: coming in, getting the club heading in the right direction, and then selling it on to someone else. I obviously don't know if they have someone lined up, but I don't see them being in for the long haul, so I'm assuming that they believe they'd have interest when they came to sell.
Really depends on the Halls personal financial situation. The Cameron Hall accounts were in a right mess which was why they had to sell the shares back to the club in 2003. There was an allegation going around that the reported approach to Sir John last summer was done to boost the share price at a time when the NUFC shares were the only asset owned by Cameron Hall. Cameron Hall has made financial commitments against their assets and were going to default a the value of the assets were low. Boosting the share price made their assets cover their commitments and bought them more time. If there is still a financial problem they may well sell the shares at a discount to just shift them, and pay off debts. The shares are in the Cameron Hall books as having cost just under 11p each, so even selling for around the current market price would give a 300% return :winking: 53m shares would give about a further £18m profit.
The thing is though, it doesn't really matter how desperate the Halls are to get rid of the shares, if the hedge fund don't see a profit to be made they won't buy them, even if they give them away. The only way they'd make a profit is if they can sell them on to someone else, so if they don't think there'll be any buyers, they won't invest. The last thing they'd want to happen is to be left owning a football club they couldn't make any money out of.
I think they'd come in, install a new management - business-wise, not neccesarily team-wise - show the city the club was going to be run using sound business principles, wait for the share price to rise, then sell-up and move on. Whether or not this is good for the club is debatable, but it's important to remember they wouldn't make much money out of a failing football club.