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Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

bbc.com

31–40 of 125 posts

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#31
post #14

From the guardian: “But about 220,000 investors, who contributed £75m in crowdfunding across seven “equity for punks” rounds, could walk away with nothing.” I used to love the idea of crowdfunding but then I watched a bunch of people buy worthless common stock and get hosed over and over.

Please note its not just them, this article says no equity holders will get anything

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#32
post #18
post #14

From the guardian: “But about 220,000 investors, who contributed £75m in crowdfunding across seven “equity for punks” rounds, could walk away with nothing.” I used to love the idea of crowdfunding but then I watched a bunch of people buy worthless common stock and get hosed over and over.

As George Carlin said, “it’s a big club, and you’re not in it.” Capitalism is not for the little guy, or at least not the version we’ve built.

No equity holders get anything here, regardless if they had common stock or not

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#34
post #18
post #14

From the guardian: “But about 220,000 investors, who contributed £75m in crowdfunding across seven “equity for punks” rounds, could walk away with nothing.” I used to love the idea of crowdfunding but then I watched a bunch of people buy worthless common stock and get hosed over and over.

As George Carlin said, “it’s a big club, and you’re not in it.” Capitalism is not for the little guy, or at least not the version we’ve built.

It's a good quote, but it is misapplied here.

Nothing is stopping you from investing in a company, or putting your money into a stock or other investment. If anything, over the years the club has become a lot less exclusive. When did Carlin say that? Think about how much more access any given person, at least in the United States, has to financial products.

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#35
post #14

From the guardian: “But about 220,000 investors, who contributed £75m in crowdfunding across seven “equity for punks” rounds, could walk away with nothing.” I used to love the idea of crowdfunding but then I watched a bunch of people buy worthless common stock and get hosed over and over.

Part of the issue is that somehow you can buy just the "assets" half of a company and ignore the "liabilities" portion. And the assets include all the branding and brand name. So an essentially new copy of the previous company is made while fleecing all on the liabilities side.

For the bars that are being closed, they are less closed and more like abandoned remnants of the now-dead previous company. Perhaps the shareholders should just reclaim the abandoned items of value physically.

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#36

I've been hearing buzz that the whole alcohol industry is in trouble, from a perfect storm of cultural changes that culminate in young people drinking less, and particularly drinking less in bars. With that context, it seems notable that the booze company in question here was purchased by a "beverage and medical cannabis " corp.

Tariffs, and retaliatory tariffs, have really messed up the US export market for alcohol too.

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#37
The article says:

  In 2017 a US equity firm TSG Consumer Partners acquired a 22% stake in Brewdog. But unlike the Equity for Punks' "ordinary" shareholders, TSG was given "preference shares". That meant that if Brewdog was sold, TSG was first in the queue to get back its investment plus any return owed, possibly leaving little or nothing for small investors.
It seems the preference shares weren't just 1x liquidation preferences. The 'plus any return owed' was 18% per year if, as I imagine, those shares are the 'C Preferred Shares' described in Brewdog's Companies House filing on 7 Jun 2017. ("Statement of capital following an allotment of shares on 6 April 2017"):

  5 Statement of capital (prescribed particulars of rights attached to shares)
  Class of share
  Preferred C Shares
  Prescribed particulars

  Amount") shall be applied as follows:
  1. an amount shall be distributed among the holders of the Preferred 'C' Ordinary Shares which shall be the greater of:
  a) the Deemed Acquired Price of all Preferred 'C' Ordinary Shares together with, in respect of each Preferred 'C' Ordinary Share an amount equal to 18 per cent of the Deemed Acquired Price per year (based on a 365 day year) accruing daily and compounding annually from the date of issue up to and including the date of the return of capital; and
  b) such amount of the Distribution Amount as would be applied to the holders of the Preferred 'C' Ordinary Shares if they ranked pari passu with 'A' Ordinary Shares and 'B' Ordinary Shares; and
  2. any balance of the Distribution Amount following the application of the amount referred to in (1) above shall be applied to the holders of the 'A' Ordinary Shares and the 'B' Ordinary Shares (in accordance with the terms of the Articles of Association), provided that in the instance that Article 6.2.1(a) applies, the Warrant Shares shall have nil value for the purposes of Article 6.2.2.
  Any return on Preferred 'C' Shares shall be made amongst their holders pro rata as nearly as possible to their respective holdings of Shares of that class.
This may seem like a lot, but it's a common structure for private equity deals, and we have no way of knowing whether that's the best deal that Brewdog's management could have struck at the time.

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#38
post #29
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As George Carlin said, “it’s a big club, and you’re not in it.” Capitalism is not for the little guy, or at least not the version we’ve built.

… they’ve built.

Are you living in a separate system that’s not associated with capitalism?

If so I’d love to know what that is so I can go there.

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe so. But it's not just the price of booze which is the problem; other problems include online dating (meeting people is now less of a reason to go to bars), cultural apprehensions about hooking up while drunk, and cannabis providing a superior experience (at least in the US, maybe less of a factor in the UK?)

Cannabis in the UK is still illegal, so unless you're picking up weed from your local dealer, it's not a big thing outside the home. But price of booze is killing pubs here. Getting close to £8 a pint now in London. £10 for a pint of Guinness in many bars.

A few years ago there was a group formed in the UK to designate cask ale/pub culture to be recognized as intangible cultural heritage through UNESCO-- following Belgium's successful foray into its brewing/beer culture being designated this way. There are a few documentaries on youtube

Re: Bars close and hundreds lose jobs as US firm buys Brewdog in £33M deal

#40
Seems like a collapse of the alcohol market would be a benefit on the order of removing leaded gas

But don’t let my biological logic stand in the way of cultural madness - if a coherent society in your view requires a poison in order to facilitate then that society is probably not worth keeping going

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