WATP_Greg

After admission of the Open Offer shares 300,000 shares would be about 0.37% of the company, so if pending payments will put RF over 0.5% it would be about 400,000 shares.

 

Pretty loose calculations though because you're talking about pending payments which haven't been used to buy shares yet and the share price has been tumbling too.

There was the deadline of early on Friday last week and I believe there is a 2 or 3 day lag between signing up for gocardless and the money being drawn down (iirc) so there was still a fair few £s from the extra members last week and even this week it is still continuing to grow.

I've been pleased to see the number of life memberships keep rising too - at £500 a go they are contributing more than 2500 shares at the current price

It's over 300k I'm sure - a good start! Once all of the donations come in that were signed up from the share issue I'm sure twitter said it will put them at over .5% of the club. So still a long way to go.

I have listened to the podcast from the first episode - Enjoy it, even if I don't agree with every opinion held.

I would probably add that I think the stereo audio (If that is the right term) can be a bit annoying to me - as I'm someone who often only has one ear bud in. Though a minor complaint amongst an enjoyable experience.

Also seen on twitter that RF doubled their shareholding at the last share issue - good news

Plenty of them helped. You are being extremely naive if you think otherwise.

From my experience at the AGM the majority was disappointed by the result - Admittedly the sample size was about 100 lads in The Louden when the results got announced but I supporse it depends how you define plenty.

Again though, it was not the fans who voted the board in - it was others.

Why can't we all just get along

1. I once thought like that until I saw up close the treachery and blackmail from fellow bears.

 

 

 

2. I care too but I've stopped waiting on the moment the support wakes up en masse and does things for themselves. Perhaps I'll be proven wrong one day.

 

 

 

3. Let's hope they don't vote in the ****s' like many did at the AGM.

1. More shares in Rangers Supporters hands is better than the alternative - Personal gripes rank well below the interest of Rangers for me.

2. Being jaded is understandable, but I believe that our support has immense potential and will continue to care about it and see what I can do to help, however small a contribution it might be. If we all contributed then we would be getting somewhere.

3. I assume you are not suggesting that the fans were the ones that ratified the position of the board members at the GM?

I like to try and be fair and after so much criticism I will give credit where it is due.

 

Regardless of who we were playing against we retained possession with interchanging passing and moving and the long ball wasn't frequently deployed.

 

We created plenty chances and always looked dangerous in the final third, crucially our midfield largely bossed the game.

 

Hopefully we can push on from here but I can't recall us playing in this manner for more than a couple of games on the trot apart from the end of 10/11.

 

As was my feeling then, it shows that we can play fairly decent football (it's illogical to suggest otherwise), so there is absolutely no reason whatsoever to see us playing aimless long balls again.

I personally thought our pressing was superb as well- something that we have clearly worked on this season.

Good to see

No idea and I am not sure I give a toss. The my dick is bigger than your dick posts forces me not to care although I do get a kick out of correcting rubbish.

Erm - I care about Rangers here - the more who have joined fan ownership vehicles the better.

I suppose the difference being that I do care

At the end of the day more shares under Rangers fans control is nothing but positive.

You said: "I believe that is RF now has the biggest membership in a collective fan ownership vehicle amongst the Rangers Support."

 

You've just contradicted yourself by quoting those figures as 2500 is greater than 1723 .

and 1723>1000

BR is the vehicle - however I have amended my post to be more specific.

As a former RST board member are you privy to how the numbers have improved this week? I asked on the other thread but no one answered. Hopefully by a good amount

Full fan ownership is more likely to protect the club and keep it safe from those who would do it harm.

 

Settling for being a minority and wilfully leaving space for an undesirable incomer to arrive and dominate the club is, to put it mildly, unwise.

 

Right now, we are open to and flirting with devastation. If RF achieves its 25% goal, that will still be the case.

 

I've stated openly since coming on to this forum that I support fan ownership. It is perfectly clear now that Rangers First is not only not going to deliver this, it has no intention of delivering it.

 

In that respect, this discussion has been very helpful.

Actually, the membership of RF will decide what is done - I am just one member. Whatever the majority says goes.

If you were able to convince the RF membership to aim for 100% ownership then thats what they would do - I have only spoken in a personal capacity.

Though I completely stand by my assertions and opinions and I am very comfortable to be part of RF and what it is trying to achieve.

BuyRangers got over 2000 in the IPO, which has since increased.

Monthly subscriptions are around 1000 mark according to Ross on FF - RF are greater than that

He also said RST membership was around 2500 iirc - he's a current RST board member

Over 1690 now. Next target 1872

1723 at last count. Not a bad improvement in a week.

I believe that is RF now has the biggest membership currently contributing in to a collective fan ownership vehicle amongst the Rangers Support.

But we need to keep going. RF applied to take up it's extra allocation so based on the shares being undersubscribed it's assumed that the full extra allocation has been taken up.

Anyways. Good win for the Gers tonight too

I'm all for respect, but I cannot be expected to approve of or join an organisation that only wants the Rangers support to be a fringe player when it comes to all the key aspects in the way that the club is run.

 

If one party has 51%, the club will be run in a way that reflects that person's thinking, and if said person has a motivation of greed, or worse, that comes ahead of the general wellbeing of the club, the club will suffer and a quarter share of ownership will find itself on the losing side time after time.

 

I cannot imagine why anyone who cares deeply for Rangers would want that, especially after all that we have witnessed, and are still witnessing.

 

I don't doubt your fondness for Rangers, but the club needs to be wrestled away permanently from those who would wreck it for a quick buck. Rangers First is not going to do that, even after all that has happened.

 

The club needs to be transformed into a member-owned club where every fan has a vote on who the president should be. It's time we embraced fan ownership fully instead of chasing a 25% share and hoping that the other 75% finds its way into appropriate hands.

 

Surely by know we must realise that this is a recipe for catastrophe.

Sorry I was watching the game, great performance btw.

You certainly shouldn't doubt my 'fondness' for Rangers. I don't feel the need to justify myself in that regard.

But I think I'll leave this discussion. I fundamentally disagree with many of the points that you are making and continue to make despite what I believe to be relevant counterpoints. I believe that there are many ways to influence the boardroom at Ibrox beyond owning 100% of the club. The scenario of a 51% nefarious owner is entirely hypothetical and with us being a plc I think it should be acknowledged that any major shareholder will hold significant sway. I am open to any solutions that I feel will help the club and the support.

While Rangers is under controversial ownership, thousands of people will not pay towards its upkeep because they believe that their money is being plundered instead of being wholly spent on the club's wellbeing.

 

If Rangers was fan-owned and in trustworthy hands, people would happily buy merchandise and attend games and do so uncomplainingly.

 

With untrusted ownership, which the RF plan leaves the door wide open to, they hold back or stay away or sometimes chuck it altogether. This current episode has already cost us support. Some will not return, and yet the RF plan is do precisely nothing to stop the whole sorry tale happening again. A lesson has not been learned here, which is both mystifying and inexcusable.

 

A quarter share will not save Rangers or make it the club it will need to be to recover its reputation both as a football club and as a sporting institution - and if the current lot can reduce Rangers to its current sorry state, don't imagine that a 25% holding is going to inhibit a majority owner with 51% or more who has acquired Rangers for reasons best known to himself.

 

Fan ownership will slam the door shut on the sharks and the charlatans. Minority ownership, however, most certainly will not.

 

I'm sorry to say it, but the RF plan looks like an exercise written up by accountants whose career experience has been to look after the books of the neighbourhood church.

 

Only by shutting out the crooks will we be properly rid of them - and the only hope of doing that is to become a fully fan-owned club.

"While Rangers is under controversial ownership, thousands of people will not pay towards its upkeep because they believe that their money is being plundered instead of being wholly spent on the club's wellbeing."

Exactly, that’s ACT is required before any subsequent investment – You really should look at what RF is proposing

"If Rangers was fan-owned and in trustworthy hands, people would happily buy merchandise and attend games and do so uncomplainingly.

I agree – Getting ACT can be a method with which trust is built with the club, however, it would also help identify where the interests of the club are not being matched by the actions of this or any future board.

With untrusted ownership, which the RF plan leaves the door wide open to, they hold back or stay away or sometimes chuck it altogether. This current episode has already cost us support. Some will not return, and yet the RF plan is do precisely nothing to stop the whole sorry tale happening again. A lesson has not been learned here, which is both mystifying and inexcusable."

Sorry, but that is a complete straw man – ACT is a safeguard and to get that we need a significant shareholding. You dismissing it does not alter the fact that circa 25% ownership is significant. Laxey have a man on the board with significantly less of a shareholding for instance.

"A quarter share will not save Rangers or make it the club it will need to be to recover its reputation both as a football club and as a sporting institution - and if the current lot can reduce Rangers to its current sorry state, don't imagine that a 25% holding is going to inhibit a majority owner with 51% or more who has acquired Rangers for reasons best known to himself."

Again 25% allows the blocking of sales of assets and shareholders have influence, I cannot understand you dismissing that so readily – look at any business environment – shareholders have great power. Personal incredulity does not change reality

"Fan ownership will slam the door shut on the sharks and the charlatans. Minority ownership, however, most certainly will not.

I'm sorry to say it, but the RF plan looks like an exercise written up by accountants whose career experience has been to look after the books of the neighbourhood church. "

I disagree, It seems that you are unfamiliar with RF – you should have a proper look at it IMO – come down The Louden tomorrow from 2 and discuss it with the lads. I’ll even buy you a pint. Also, why the use of such derogatory terminology, RF has the largest number of individuals involved in a collective shareholding initiative amongst the Rangers support – surely it deserves a bit of respect. But I would like Rangers supporters to always be respectful of one another.

"Only by shutting out the crooks will we be properly rid of them - and the only hope of doing that is to become a fully fan-owned club."

Not the only way IMO.

Hopefully I have tried to put across my own opinions on the matter – I think that either option would be better than the current situation so I urge all Rangers supporters to get involved in a collective shareholding initiative.

Not going for full fan ownership is both timid and bizarre.

 

I find it so frustrating when people who have been persuaded that fans having a stake in their club - together - is a step in the right direction then back off from taking it the whole way to its logical conclusion.

 

I believe in fan ownership but I could not lend my support to Rangers First or back it financially. It seems to me to be a road to future disillusionment, and yet this could easily be avoided if it was to bite wholeheartedly into the fan ownership bullet.

 

We need boldness to make the revolution happen. RF should go for full fan ownership instead of having an ambition to be a minority player.

To each their own - I find your attitude to 25% ownership (an order of magnitude higher than current collective shareholding efforts) strange - particularly when you led with the point of stopping the sale of assets - which of course 25% legally can avoid.

If we are specifically speaking of RF then I find the possibility of using the monthly donations to improve the Rangers Community a fantastic idea and would allow us to gain a competitive advantage over our rivals into the future - that is more important to me than whether we have 100% ownership of the club - as long as we can influence the club so that it is being run in the correct manner (which circa 25% would certainly contribute to despite your protestations) as such a shareholding would do in any PLC.

I think this is a prime example of why having two separate vehicles offers advantages and choice.

Having a goal of owning a mere quarter of the club and then drawing a line under it is, I regret to say, political naivety and an own goal.

 

The sharks can still come in to swim in the Rangers pond, and if they are ruthless enough, they will chew up and spit out minority shareholders without drawing breath. It sounds as though this 25% plan has been drawn up by beancounters who have no concept of the clout that majority owners with menace on their minds have.

 

Fan ownership excludes the sharks from existing within our midst, and even if the odd one does make it to the highest office, we can elect him away and choose - actually choose - his or her replacement.

 

This 25% idea is a sticking plaster and bandages non-solution to our problems. The club needs a revolution, and the revolution is full fan ownership. I really wonder why we are so afraid of it.

Entirely disagree. As I have stated 25% stops the key fear that you raised.

The most influential people at Ibrox just now own significantly less than 25%.

Why settle for second best? Why be a minority to an uninvited majority owner? If Mike Ashley owned 51% of Rangers, and if he wanted to sell off Murray Park or Ibrox, do you really think a 25% stake would stop him?

 

We are being manipulated already with this new membership sham and decent fans are falling for it. Any CEO of Rangers with a fast buck priority will easily neutralise a minority group holding 25%. Settling for being a minority stakeholder in Rangers is an accident waiting to happen.

 

We have to learn our lesson - a halfway house - or quarter way - towards fan ownership is not the answer. Outright ownership where the members, not the shareholders, own the club is the revolution that simply has to happen.

 

We don't need any more chairmen - we need elected presidents.

I don't think it is 2nd best. Having some Hight Net Worth Individuals involved could be beneficial for the club. A proper established Rangers could attract significant investment and help us build a self sustaining but completely dominant club IMO

And yes it would stop him. The 25% is a legal thing. If we own that amount we can legally block the sale of assets. It's in that video I linked earlier detailing what different levels of ownership get you.

How much do the people who are running Rangers now own? Or even hold the proxy for? It isn't anywhere near 51%.

I think you are underestimating the power of the support owning a collective shareholding in the club even if it is not a majority holding

But as FO increases we need to go through the various stages. Once we get to a level where we have enough influence it will tail off. I suspect that will be circa 25% but if the appetite is greater then so be it. At the end of the day the majority of Rangers supporters need to get involved and decide for themselves

Imagine being a fan-owned club. Imagine electing a president to oversee and organise the club instead of not knowing from one day to the next who is going to own it, when it is going to be sold, or which important club asset is going to be unloaded.

 

Imagine a chairman choosing to sell Ibrox and doing it against the wishes of almost all Rangers fans. It could happen, and we are rightly very worried about the possibility.

 

Imagine a president trying to do the same thing but being stopped in his tracks by democratic processes within the club. In a fan-owned club the people matter because the people are the club - not just in terms of allegiance - but in a legal sense. Rangers would belong to us - not uninvited strangers.

 

The case to be fan-owned is very powerful. Right now, we are the people who don't have a say in how our club goes about its business. In the future, if we become fan-owned, we will be the people who matter and the people who make the club an honest and honourable Scottish sporting institution again.

 

I know that people have issues with various personalities in and around fan groups but the message must overcome this. The RST wants each and every one of us to stand together to own Rangers, to make Rangers what we never tire telling people what we believe we already are - the people's club - not for factions, not for dubious business types and not for asset strippers.

 

John Lennon used to saw that 'war is over', but he always qualified it by adding: 'if you want it'. Well, Rangers can belong to us - every red brick in the stadium and every blade of grass on the pitch - if we want it.

 

That's why I am part of the RST's BuyRangers and I hope many of you will join me in becoming a part of it.

You only need 25% to block the sale of major assets iirc. So a significant shareholding could result in similar benefits without outright ownership.

But that isn't to take away from your passionate pitch. Increased fan involvement at the highest level of our club is desirable as it will help forge unity between the perceived direction of the club and the desired direction of the club imo and allow us to move forward as a team and support - helping to forge a better Rangers

Best of luck

There will never be the perfect fan group which can represent the whole support. We're too diverse in nature and view Rangers differently. Example being, some see it as an extension of protestantism, some don't. Same argument for unionism.

 

Having experience with the RST I know the selfless work that goes into getting things off the ground and maintaining it. I don't doubt it is any different with the RSAs, VB, RF and whoever claims to be a group nowadays. However, like Barca72, I do not trust the other groups for the simple fact I have first hand experience of people's behaviour which still leaves a bad taste in the mouth.

 

The only way these differences will ever be overcome is a credible board bringing all them in and offering the groups an opportunity to work together alongside the club. Administration drove a deeper wedge IMO and RF's appearance hasn't helped. This argument will go on forever until the club steps in with credible plans of being 'better together'.

On twitter there RF has commented that with the donations that have came in over the last week and assuming the capability of getting those shares at the coming issue then they will have over 0.5%. I think that's a good start and I believe the majority of that would not have been put into FO without RF. That to me is a very good thing.

With regards to trust - it is up to each of the organisations to ensure they have the correct procedures and processes in place to ensure a level of transparency so that trust comes naturally.

I can't agree with that at all because each of the 3 groups mentioned (RST, RF & VB) would be highly unlikely to give away the proxy voting rights of the block of shares their members have contributed to. All 3 would probably be happy to receive proxy voting rights to increase the size of their voting block, but there's virtually no chance any of the 3 groups will hand over their voting rights to another fan group or voting block.

I agree - Being a member of the each of the organisations is what grants you voting rights over the shares contained within them (Though RST membership as a whole votes for BR's shares I believe).

I think all the FO vehicles should be on good terms but I actual formal unification is complicated and potentially unworkable imo

I would hope for the sake of our club they could identify common goals and where appropriate' date=' work together to achieve them. I honestly think if fans can see change being effected, even if it requires them working together to achieve the 5% then all will benefit as a consequence.[/quote']

 

I think in the main the supporters will vote the same way - and assuming all vehicles are OMOV then working together shouldn't be an issue. Formal unification I think is not needed but we are all Rangers Supporters at the end of the day

The RST wants fan ownership.

 

RF wants something that appears to fall a good bit short of that.

 

Vanguard Bears wants what exactly - full fan ownership or a halfway house?

 

If fan ownership is the goal, there should only be one group because having more than one leads to confusion and mixed messages, so who wants fan ownership and who doesn't?

 

If the goal is the same, co-operation and unity should be achievable, but if it is not, they will remain apart - and so will our supporters.

RF want the benefits of FO but not the need to have 100% of the club - as a PLC I think its entirely appropriate. If we got to 25% we wouldn't need to go any higher imo

Those who resigned from their posts on the RST board. If I am mistaken in thinking that any of them are now involved in RF, please accept my sincere apologies.

I would rather stay out of that stuff. I have heard both sides of the reasonings for leaving the RST and I don't have anything to say on the matter as it is not for me to discuss (being a complete outsider to the issues).

It is in my opinion a fallacy that RF is a splinter group from the RST - the majority of people involved were not part of any RST projects in the past.

However, I think RF as an organisation has always been on point in maintaining the point that anyone going for a collective shareholding is positive (RF, BR and VB's schemes often mentioned).

At the end of the day, it is Rangers and the support that is the important things. All these vehicles are a means to an end - to make Rangers better

ACT?

 

Perhaps you should explain this.

authoritative consultative transparency.

It's in the video http://www.rangersfirst.org/rangers-share-issue/

Sorry assumed most on this thread had looked into RF.

I was under the impression that some of your leading lights did just that fairly recently. Anyway, thanks for answering.

Who and what are you referring to? I can't comment on something I haven't seen.