Daniel Levy’s sudden dismissal last September put the Lewis family in the spotlight like never before. Without Levy there to run the club and act as the lightning rod for criticism, more questions have been asked of the Lewis family regarding their long-term plans.
Throughout, the Lewis family have been very clear that they do not want to sell up. A consortium did express interest last September, which led to a source close to the Lewis family dismissing it as “unsolicited and unnecessary interest”.
But whatever happens over the last two games of this season, the question of the Lewis family’s long-term intentions for Tottenham Hotspur won’t go away for long. Especially with fans aghast at the struggles of the club this season, facing the fear of their first relegation for 50 years. The Lewis family’s position, that the club is not for sale, is steadfast, regardless of which division Spurs are playing in next season.
There is another potential factor regarding the ownership of the club worth considering. And that is ENIC granting themselves ‘warrants’ to acquire extra shares, at the cost of diluting the club’s 30,000 minority shareholders.
First issued in June 2022 when ENIC injected £100 million (then $124.7m) into Spurs, the warrants grant ENIC the option to buy up further shares in the club at no extra cost. The warrants previously equated to five per cent of club shares as at the June 2022 issue date, but ‘step up’ by 1.5 per cent annually between March 2025 and June 2032. At that point, assuming all of those annual step-ups take place, the warrants will comprise 15.5 per cent of Spurs’ June 2022 capital base.
So why does this matter? The accounts state that these warrants are only converted “on a change of control”. Put simply, if ENIC were to sell, these warrants would be cashed out, effectively granting them a sweetener or a bonus on top of the money they would get for their majority shareholding.But given that these warrants have only been awarded to ENIC, they effectively come at the cost of the minority shareholders. The creation of the warrants has a dilutive effect on the entire shareholding, as it creates what is in effect a separate pot of shares. But that pot will belong — at a change of control — entirely to ENIC.
The minority shareholders — of which there are roughly 30,000 — currently own 12.38 per cent of the shareholding of Tottenham Hotspur Limited, i.e. the part that is not owned by ENIC. Many of those shareholders — some estimate as many as half — only own one share each. Their prime motivation is not financial, not expecting a return on their investment or dividends, but rather romantic: they want to own a small part of the club that they support.
Existing minority shareholders do have the option to sell their shares on Asset Match, an online trading platform. Asset Match runs auctions in Spurs shares every two months.
That minority shareholding could be very valuable. If we take Forbes’ 2024 enterprise valuation of Tottenham Hotspur of £2.6billion and deduct £793m in net debt, the club’s equity was valued at £1.8bn. A 12.38 per cent share of that — the sum proportion of today’s minority shareholdings — was deemed to be worth £225m. If the enterprise value of the club were higher at, say, £3bn, the minority shareholders’ proportion of the equity element would be worth £273m.
But the issue is that those minority shareholders are currently in a weak position. They have no protections (such as anti-dilution rights), no board rights, and no rights to dividends. Nor have they ever been offered the chance to participate in any of the capital injections through which ENIC has invested money in recent years.
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