Manchester United IPO On Track, Terms Set... Still Looks Like Facebook

Just last week came the report that the highly awaited Manchester United initial public offering was likely to be delayed.  We noted specifically ahead of that news how the U.K. soccer team’s IPO looked and felt a lot like the Facebook, Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) IPO on a smaller scale.  Well, it turns out that the IPO was not really delayed and the amended filing has now arrived with terms.  An SEC filing shortly after the close of Monday’s trading shows that the soccer club has filed to sell some 16,666,667 shares of its stock.

Terms are being set at $16.00 to $20.00 per Class A ordinary share.  Half of the shares are being sold on behalf of Manchester United, and half of the shares are being sold on behalf of Red Football LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Red Football Limited Partnership which is controlled by six lineal descendants of Mr. Malcolm Glazer. The selling shareholder has granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to 2,500,000 Class A ordinary shares to cover over-allotments.

The soccer club will list its shares on the New York Stock Exchange under the stock symbol “MANU,” subject to official notice of issuance. As a reminder, there will be two classes of stock and the company’s description is as follows: “Following this offering, we will have two classes of ordinary shares outstanding: Class A ordinary shares and Class B ordinary shares. The rights of the holders of our Class A ordinary shares and our Class B ordinary shares are identical, except with respect to voting and conversion. Each Class A ordinary share is entitled to one vote per share and is not convertible into any other shares of our capital stock. Each Class B ordinary share is entitled to 10 votes per share and is convertible into one Class A ordinary share at any time.”

We cannot help but to notice how large the underwriting group is. Jefferies, Credit Suisse, and J.P. Morgan are the book-runners.  Other managers listed in the syndicate are as follows: BofA Merrill Lynch, Deutsche Bank Securities, Aon Benfield, Securities, Inc., Banco Santander, BNP PARIBAS, BOCI Asia Limited , CIMB Securities, DBS Bank Ltd., Nomura, and Raymond James.

This is the most popular soccer team that there is and it boasts a global community of 659 million followers. The total Class A ordinary shares to be outstanding after this offering is 39,685,700 shares and the total Class B ordinary shares to be outstanding after this offering is 124,000,000 shares.  Manchester United intends to use the proceeds it receives to pay down debt.

Here is the company’s breakdown of the voting rights: “The Class A ordinary shares and Class B ordinary shares outstanding after this offering will represent approximately 24.2% and 75.8%, respectively, of the total number of shares of our Class A and Class B ordinary shares outstanding after this offering and 3.1% and 96.9%, respectively, of the combined voting power of our Class A and Class B ordinary shares outstanding after this offering.”

FULL SEC FILING

JON C. OGG