Philip Green, does anyone care what the truth is?

[sidicks]

crankedup said:

Erm, how about the intervening years 2005 - 2015.

What about them?

He didn't take any dividends during this period, as far as I'm aware?

What is your point exactly?

crankedup said:

For such an established high street name it must take dedication to drive it into the ground within such a short time frame. From the outside some may think he took his divi's during the easy years and almost ignored BHS when the going got more difficult. Green will say how many millions he poured in attempting to turn the brand around, and failed. King of the High Street, astute businessman, wealthy and well connected, and yet oversees the destruction of a very well respected business seeing many thousands of loyal employees lose their jobs. I watched his interview with Preston the other night on the tele,

Established brand with low profit margin products, increasing costs and increased competition in the wake of Internet sales.

[Eric Mc]

sidicks said:

Established brand with low profit margin products, increasing costs and increased competition in the wake of Internet sales.

And a supposed business genius in charge. It seems being a business giant is useless in the face of the challenge of the internet.

[anonymous-user]

johnfm said:

Agreed - it is an interesting theory.

We have a problem... the Russians are all skinny.

[Adrian W]

JNW1 said:

Sorry, what claim was that? What I said was that during Green's ownership the pension schemes went from surplus to deficit whilst at the same time he and his family took hundreds of millions out of the business - I think that's actually a matter of record and the link to the article I posted supports that?

What about the £800 Million Green says he put in over the period, which is nearly three times what he took out why are you choosing to ignore this?

[sidicks]

Eric Mc said:

sidicks said:

Established brand with low profit margin products, increasing costs and increased competition in the wake of Internet sales.

And a supposed business genius in charge. It seems being a business giant is useless in the face of the challenge of the internet.

Plenty of businesses have been unable to adapt to the technological changes we have seen. But, as I outlined earlier, Green was certainly running the business to maximise his returns on a short-term basis, not looking to the long-term.

[Eric Mc]

We agree on something.

[sidicks]

Eric Mc said:

We agree on something.

I am sure we agree on a lot of things, you've seemingly chosen to disagree with many things that a) I haven't actually said and b) don't actually believe!

Edited by sidicks on Wednesday 19th October 16:48

[Trophy Husband]

He's a specious toad of the highest order. I hope they throw the book at him, if there is a book that is.

[JNW1]

Adrian W said:

JNW1 said:

Sorry, what claim was that? What I said was that during Green's ownership the pension schemes went from surplus to deficit whilst at the same time he and his family took hundreds of millions out of the business - I think that's actually a matter of record and the link to the article I posted supports that?

What about the £800 Million Green says he put in over the period, which is nearly three times what he took out why are you choosing to ignore this?

I think the FT reckoned that in total Green and his family took around £1.2 billion out of BHS during his period of ownership.....

[sidicks]

JNW1 said:

I think the FT reckoned that in total Green and his family took around £1.2 billion out of BHS during his period of ownership.....

Wasn't that out of Arcadia group, not BHS?

[edh]

fblm said:

edh said:

Lots of focus here on the pension scheme & very little on the sale of BHS to Chappell et al. It was never ever going to fly & those people appeared to be in only so they could strip out as much cash as they could find.

Agreed. Sadly given Chappell's history (not least in motorsport) what transpired should be of no surprise. What did surprise me was the line (in wiki) ;"when it became likely that BHS would be going into receivership Chappell had moved £1.5 million from the firm to a company owned by a friend who was also a fellow board member of Retail Acquisitions. The sum had been later refunded at the request of BHS' chief executive Darren Topp (less £50,000 bank transaction fees)". 50k in transaction fees on a 1.5m transfer?

That's not the half of it - from what I've read it appears that most of the Chappell companies associated with the BHS deal are disappearing leaving their liabilities behind.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/aug/27/d...

of course that's just "smart" business isn't it?

[sidicks]

Article said: said:

"The Insolvency Service and the Pensions Regulator are both investigating the former owner of BHS. The Serious Fraud Office is also considering whether to launch a formal investigation."

Something to look forward to!

[johnfm]

fblm said:

johnfm said:

Agreed - it is an interesting theory.

We have a problem... the Russians are all skinny.

Doesn't that mean they're squeaky clean and honest as the day is long?

[IroningMan]

Eric Mc said:

sidicks said:

Eric Mc said:

We are obviously talking cross purposes here. That's EXACTLY what I said,.

But, was it CRIMINAL? Did he break any laws at that time?

Was stealing a criminal offence in the 1980s.

Tricky one that. Try google.

I am pretty sure that what Maxwell did at that time was NOT against the rules as they existed back then. Indeed, much of the modern legislation regarding the protections surrounding pension funds arose because of what Maxwell had been up to.

The point I am making is that Maxwell is now considered to have behaved abysmally because of what he did - but he actually didn't (as far as we know) break the law.

Green PERHAPS is in the same position today - but the laws are much tighter and you need to be far cleverer to skirt around them.

(And I would like it if you didn't impugn my professional capabilities on a public forum, thank you very much).

Nick0137 said:

For anyone interested in whether Robert Maxwell committed criminal offences in relation to pension fund assets.....In short, he was never charged as he had died, all defendants at the criminal trials were acquitted, the DTI Inspectors did not make findings of criminality, and the uses made of pension fund assets for private corporate interests (which are, obviously, very different from not making further contributions into a pension scheme) were widely known at the time by management and professional advisers but never really complained about.

http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/http:/...

Maxwell no more of a crook that Philip Green, apparently.

[Rovinghawk]

johnfm said:

Psychology and sociology "wishy washy"?

Really? The human psyche and how people behave drives every single activity on the planet. How can the study of that be wishy-washy?

For every pshrink who can tell you why something is good there's another that will give equally plausible reasons why it's bad.

[crankedup]

sidicks said:

crankedup said:

Erm, how about the intervening years 2005 - 2015.

What about them?

He didn't take any dividends during this period, as far as I'm aware?

What is your point exactly?

crankedup said:

For such an established high street name it must take dedication to drive it into the ground within such a shorttime frame. From the outside some may think he took his divi's during the easy years and almost ignored BHS when the going got more difficult. Green will say how many millions he poured in attempting to turn the brand around, and failed. King of the High Street, astute businessman, wealthy and well connected, and yet oversees the destruction of a very well respected business seeing many thousands of loyal employees lose their jobs. I watched his interview with Preston the other night on the tele,

Established brand with low profit margin products, increasing costs and increased competition in the wake of Internet sales.

My point is, and I really didn't expect to spell it out but if it helps you to understand. The guy extracted millions of pounds in div's during the fat easy period. His efforts to drive the brand forward post fat years were all unsuccessful, so much for high street king tag. With a number of other high street brands under his name It looks like he took his eye off the ball with BHS. He poured in millions of pounds, tax efficiency. maybe? A business as big as BHS would have had a multitude of escape avenues and yet. Funny smell, have to agree with Frank Field, it doesn't add up, just like the pension scheme.

[crankedup]

Eric Mc said:

sidicks said:

Established brand with low profit margin products, increasing costs and increased competition in the wake of Internet sales.

And a supposed business genius in charge. It seems being a business giant is useless in the face of the challenge of the internet.

Not at all, although it takes foresight, enginuity and lots of money to be able to re-establish a high street brand. A boss with plenty of distractions is less likely to succeed than a CEO heading up the business, for example M&S.

[crankedup]

sidicks said:

Eric Mc said:

sidicks said:

Established brand with low profit margin products, increasing costs and increased competition in the wake of Internet sales.

And a supposed business genius in charge. It seems being a business giant is useless in the face of the challenge of the internet.

Plenty of businesses have been unable to adapt to the technological changes we have seen. But, as I outlined earlier, Green was certainly running the business to maximise his returns on a short-term basis, not looking to the long-term.

For goodness sake it is plainly obvious what BHS was to Green and what it meant to him.

[Rovinghawk]

el stovey said:

I mean if you have no empathy, you might not be able to see that you're a sociopath? I haven't ever heard of any of the usual NPandE suspects go and get themselves checked out to see if they could do with some professional help.

When I was a poor starving student I earned a few quid as a guinea pig for the psych department. After much examination they concluded that I'm fairly normal apart from an exceptional memory and low artistic creativity.

el stovey said:

You've been here a while, it's quite clear there are loads of people in here that aren't wired up in a way that probably benefits society.

Benefitting society is a noble idea but I was brought up to look after myself before hand-wringing about others.

[sidicks]

crankedup said:

My point is, and I really didn't expect to spell it out but if it helps you to understand.
The guy extracted millions of pounds in div's during the fat easy period.

You quoted my post, yet your comment was seemingly entirely unrelated to the issue being discussed, hence the confusion.

You are correct that he took dividends when the business was profitable. That seems unworthy of comment and unrelated to the pension deficit-dividend issue!

crankedup said:

His efforts to drive the brand forward post fat years were all unsuccessful, so much for high street king tag. With a number of other high street brands under his name It looks like he took his eye off the ball with BHS. He poured in millions of pounds, tax efficiency. maybe?

He invested hundreds of millions of pounds in the business and not only do you fail to acknowledge this in your comments about the money he took out of the business, you now seek to position this as some form of tax avoidance measure!

crankedup said:

A business as big as BHS would have had a multitude of escape avenues and yet. Funny smell, have to agree with Frank Field, it doesn't add up, just like the pension scheme.

So you are suggesting he deliberately ran the business down, thus minimising the amount he could sell it for? I'm not sure I understand the logic, perhaps you can explain?

The pension scheme position does add up - market movements...!!

Edited by sidicks on Wednesday 19th October 19:06