(News Bulletin 247) – The Manchester United group, which owns the professional football club, saw its market valuation drop by more than 700 million dollars on Tuesday in New York. The Glazer family have reportedly decided not to sell the club for lack of satisfactory offers.

Manchester United plc, controlling the English professional football club and listed in New York, saw its market capitalization drop by more than 700 million dollars in Tuesday’s session alone, destabilized by press reports reporting the withdrawal of the sale of ManU.

The British daily DailyMail reported in its Sunday edition that the Glazer family, the majority shareholder of the club, would have given up on selling its stake, judging the offers submitted too low.

On Tuesday, the group, listed on the New York Stock Exchange, one of the two main stock exchanges in New York, fell by 18.22% in one day, thus erasing in passing just over 700 million dollars of capitalization. It was the stock’s biggest single-session drop since its IPO in 2012.

Offers too low for the Glazer family

According to the British press, the two potential buyers still in the running, the founder and CEO of the petrochemical group Ineos, Jim Ratcliffe, and Sheikh Jassin Ben Hamad al-Thani, president of the Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB), have both submitted close deals, which value the club at around five billion pounds, or about $6.3 billion.

But, according to the DailyMail, the Glazers were hoping for some ten billion pounds to leave control of ManU, of which they hold about two-thirds of the capital, but almost all of the voting rights. The figure is significantly higher than the estimate given by most other UK media of around £6 billion.

Manchester United’s market cap is now $3.15 billion, less than half the price the Glazers are hoping for ($7.5 billion). Citing anonymous sources close to the Glazers and potential buyers, the specialized site 90min indicated that discussions were continuing with a view to a sale.

The club was gradually bought between 2003 and 2005 by American entrepreneur Malcolm Glazer, who then sold his shares to his six children on his death in 2014. The businessman’s heirs announced in November 2022 that they were considering the sale of the three-time Champions League-winning club.

Many ManU supporters are hostile to the Glazers, whom they accuse of having put the club in debt when it was taken over and of not having invested enough to allow the Mancunian institution to remain competitive.

(With AFP)