The authoritative Swiss Ramble has spent part of the festive season in his Zurich fastness analysing the latest accounts of Millwall FC.
The pre-tax loss widened from £0.7m to £10.9m, largely due to profit on player sales dropping £5.3m to £0.1m, though COVID and a run to FA Cup quarter-final prior year meant revenue fell £2.0m (11%) from £18.4m to £16.4m, while expenses rose £2.3m.
The revenue decrease was largely driven by match day falling £1.3m (23%) to £4.4m, as five games were played behind closed doors, while broadcasting decreased £0.7m (7%) to £9.4m. Commercial income held steady at £2.7m.
The loss of £10.9m is still only mid-table in the Championship. This result is likely to look better when other clubs publish their COVID-impacted 2019/20 accounts. In fact, before the pandemic, no fewer than six clubs posted losses above £20m.
It is also worth noting that some clubs’ figures were boosted by once-off accounting profits from the sale of stadiums, training grounds and land, so their underlying position was worse than the figures show.
Excluding these property sales, only five Championship clubs were profitable in 2018/19 with £11m highest profits at Bristol City and Brentford. On this basis, the Lions £11m loss was actually 11th best in the division – not bad for a team that finished just outside the play-offs.
The club have lost £67m in the last 10 years. Their losses had been falling – from £12m in 2015 to just £1m in 2019. However, this season’s figure was adversely affected by lower player sales, higher wages and no cup run (worth £2.2m in 2018/19).
Millwall have rarely made big money from player sales. In fact, they have only twice in the last 10 years generated a profit above £0.5m from this activity:.
The £10m operating loss was still the second best performance in the Championship, a division where most clubs operate at a significant loss, due to very high wages to turnover ratios, as they compete for promotion to the “promised land” of the Premier League.
The £16m revenue is still one of the smallest in the Championship, though it was just above Hull City, the only other club ton have published 2019/20 accounts to date. Less than a quarter of WBA £71m, Stoke City £71m and Swansea City £68m. Some clubs are boosted by parachute payments, but even if these are excluded the club's revenue is relatively low [which suggests they have been punching above their weight].
The wage bill rose by £2.0m (12%) from £16.9m to £18.9m, reflecting investment into the playing squad plus the change in manager during the season. Wages have now more than doubled since promotion from £9.4m in League One in 2017.
The wages to turnover ratio increased from 92% to 115%, which is not great, but this is pretty much the norm in this ultra-competitive division, where 16 clubs are above 100%, much worse than UEFA’s recommended 70% upper limit.
Directors’ remuneration was unchanged at £312k, but this was still significantly lower than the likes of Reading £1.5m, WBA £953k, Birmingham City £932k and Nottingham Forest £932k.
The player trading objective in most seasons seems to be to balance the books. Even though they increased gross spend in last two seasons, this was matched by higher sales, so have still ended up essentially break-even. Number of senior players low compared to other clubs.
The gross debt was unchanged at £9.7m of loan notes, where repayment has been extended again to July 2022. This would be around £30m higher without the owners Chestnut Hill Ventures (CHV) effectively writing-off debt as equity.
[All fans want their clubs to do better on the pitch, but off the pitch the club seems to be well run financially even if there are necessary limits to 'ambition'.] Attendance fell from 13,635 to 10,748, due to five games behind closed doors. For games played with fans, attendance rose slightly to 13,734. Whichever way you look at it, this is one of the lowest in the Championship, only above Hull City, Brentford, Wigan and Luton Town.
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