Billy

finance, entrepreneurs and MUFC

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@ASvanevik @saranormous He is far cooler than me

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@recap_david @therecapai Newsletter

[Billy @Billynaveed]

Great catching up after all these years @Jason haven’t aged a day! Glad we could bring some luck to your Knicks 🤣

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@rexan_wong @ycombinator @sama @elonmusk @garrytan Amazing bro well done. You will be blown away by that city. Happy to connect you to some folk when you are there

[Denislav Jeliazkov @DenisJeliazkov]

I'm a design addict—and an airplane nerd.

I've studied THOUSANDS of interfaces—and @Flighty is the best-designed travel app I've ever seen.

Here's a full breakdown of 9 magical features & what you can learn from them 🧵

[tobi lutke @tobi]

Man, sesame’s voice model is absolutely insane. You have to try this demo. GG @brendaniribe

https://t.co/UwfKxjSnPx

[Billy @Billynaveed]

Garnacho by far our best player tonight. Ineos looking to sell him is unforgivable. Burning the furniture to heat your house. #MUFC #GarnachoIn

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@UnitedStandMUFC Maybe they had written the bit about the massive debt pile and the glazers investing less money in the club than Stokes owners in white or something because I can’t see it

[The Kobeissi Letter @KobeissiLetter]

This is beyond insane:

Donald Trump just launched a meme coin, $TRUMP, which is now over +4,200% in 2 hours.

The market cap now stands at $7.7 BILLION in a causal meme coin launch on a Friday night.

What is happening?

[Billy @Billynaveed]

"without the additional income that going deep in the CL generates, MUFC’s debt will only rise."

[The Swedish Rumble 🔰 @SwedishRumble]

In short: Cash and a rising debt is what is holding MUFC’s spending back, all fixable with support from the owner. Especially this season — FFP is not a major concern.

The worse the club performs on the pitch the coming years, the tougher it of course gets to comply with FFP.

However — with that said — there are different degrees of “levers” a club can explore in emergency situations. Some are very uncontroversial and low hanging fruit — like pushing expense back. PSG would surely be prepared to loan a player like Nuno Mendes to United with an obligation to buy, meaning that United’s cost is pushed forward. PSG agree to deals like that all the times.

Ineos isn’t sponsoring a penny to United currently, they can’t sponsor United above market value — but it’s 100% uncontroversial to increase United’s revenue with 20-30m per year (problem for City is that the amounts totaled what 200m).

Etc etc etc.

My point is just this, let’s say United finish 15th in the league this season, next season and the season after that — would the club get into trouble if it signs players in January? For sure — unless it gets support from the owner. BUT — even in that nightmarish situation, three 15th overall finishes in a row, I wouldn’t rule out that WITH support from an owner, the club could come up with ways to spend without breaching FFP. At least temporarily.

So any talk about United being absolutely prevented from spending due to FFP is just close to complete nonsense, or should at least come with a fat asterisk.

At the bottom line, the financial situation of MUFC is very clear. Unless the club gets back into the CL, preferably next season, and starts going into the final 4 of that tournament several seasons in a row — the club is beyond saving without financial support from the owners. ,

Why? In very simply terms, without the additional income that going deep in the CL generates, MUFC’s debt will only rise. Net debt has doubled the last 4 years. To be able to reduce the debt being a non-CL club, United must cut spending to the levels of West Ham and co. This is not even getting into the fact that a new stadium must be built. So — it’s quite clear.

So what does this mean, the club is beyond saving without support from the owners? It’s the end of the world? You know the saying, there are only two things certain in life, death and taxes. You could add a third thing, all football clubs will lose money.

So United needs financial support from its owner? Well, this puts the club on par with almost every other club in the PL, the Championship, L1 and L2 — that to different degrees from time to time needs outside financial support. Owning a football club is an expensive hobby, not because buying the club is expensive, it is, but you often get it back and then some when you sell it — but because football clubs burns money. Always have.

And this does not just apply to English clubs. Real Madrid — who everyone praise so much today — during a period of like 5-10 years on three occasions sold training grounds, land and TV rights around the period between 2000-2015. Since it was bought by the state, these transactions were even investigated as illegal state aid.

This is why I get a bit allergic when I see a unanimous punditry core around United blame all the clubs issues on “mismanagement”. I am not defending Ed Woodward, don’t get me wrong, but United hasn’t wasted more money on bad signings than Real Madrid or Barca have the last 15-20 years.

The difference is that when those clubs was at risk of falling out of the top 4-8 of the football world — they stepped up and spent 3x as much as the rest to claw their way back up to the top. United has always done the complete opposite, spent less than required to get to the top, but still a lot. United should easily have had a cushion to make bad signings, and still get back to the top -- if it wasn't for the club being forced to spend over a billion on servicing Glazers' debt. This is the real problem.

In fact -- there is only one blueprint that is proven in football to work, and a bunch of other blueprints that have been proven to not work, time, after time, after time.

It’s very simple, the only viable financial alternative when owning a football club with aspirations is to do what Boehly did with Chelsea. Spend so much that you can’t fail, then you have a top team, you cut back on spending.

Any alternative that is based on a notion that you will be "smarter" than everyone else — has been proven to not work. During the last 30 years, I would say that there is not one example of a club that over time has been able to punch above its weight class.

History is clear that it’s possible to temporary move up a notch or two, during sort of a “golden era”, but if that isn’t backed up by financial spending, everyone without exception falls back after app. 4-5 years. And it’s also very clear that it’s extremely hard to get a golden era. Of the top 100 clubs in Europe, there are what, 3-4 that really manage to punch above its weight class for more than half a season here and there. Perhaps a Girona, Brighton, Leverkusen or Atalanta right now. Can Leverkusen and Atalanta stay at the top? Napoli was up there for what 18 months -- and has since fallen off a cliff. Liverpool did it under Klopp and stayed up, but it took them 30 years of trying after winning the league in 89’. For Arsenal it took 20 years after Wenger’s golden age, to get back to the top under Arteta. It’s not easy.

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@AndrewHires Prayers are with you and your family buddy. Be safe that’s the most important thing.

[Billy @Billynaveed]

Prayers for those in LA fires. Be safe

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@Nike I know you are having a hard time right now. You thought you were an eCommerce company and now the channel is fighting back. But if you want to be an eCommerce company let’s get the basics right first.

I am trying to order.
The size I need is out of stock.

Put a radio button next to the out of stock size that’s says” notify me”. Next time it comes in send me a push notification. If it’s isn’t in stock in 5 days simply suggest another colour that is in stock.

Simple, value add.

Regards
Your loyal for Metcons customer

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@UnitedStandMUFC These pundits should just hang up their boots. If he thinks that farce is the manager’s fault he hasn’t watched United for the last decade. It’s the players. We need a clear out and restart. Ineos need to invite Qatar to the table because organically this will take a decade.

[Gary Vaynerchuk @garyvee]

Man …. Watching this 16-17 years later and knowing so many Fortune 500 companies still would rather do traditional or traditional digital instead of social , social live shopping, credit and Influncer marketing makes my head spin .. for all you small businesses, creators, influencers … as we head into 2025 the opportunity is clear - go all in on social media creative on all platforms not just instagram ( https://t.co/yydu1nsSM1) and make sure you never fall in love with yesterday - the big companies continue to fuck up and are still doing TV commercials and banner ads and other dumb shit - use that waste as your advantage to gain market share …

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@UnitedStandMUFC @FabrizioRomano The redemption arc of the year

[Billy @Billynaveed]

This is outrageous. I just don't understand why they can't just admit that they got it wrong

[The United Tribune @utdtribune]

Notice how shocked Gallagher is that he was challenged. He goes completely mute.

“It’s not easy being a ref.”

Just admit you’re cheating and taking huge payouts from Saudi, mate.

It’s so blatantly disgusting at this point🩸#MUFC

[Billy @Billynaveed]

Scenes….Amad-ness. Build a statue for him

[The United Stand @UnitedStandMUFC]

Good night ❤️

[Billy @Billynaveed]

@indusvalleybc Even bigger rug pull

[Billy @Billynaveed]

Diamonds are going to prove to be the biggest rug pull in human history. 💎

De Beers once controlled the diamond supply so tightly that they created the illusion of scarcity.

Then came 1938. “A Diamond is Forever” became a cultural slogan—arguably the most successful marketing campaign in history, turning diamonds into a symbol of love and commitment.

But monopolies don’t last forever.
•Russia began bypassing De Beers’ supply chains, breaking their grip.
•In 2011, the Oppenheimer family sold their 40% stake to Anglo American, which eventually grew its control to 85% by 2024.

Today, the rise of synthetic diamonds—first from China, now from India—has reshaped the market. Millennials prefer affordability and ethics, and synthetics deliver both. They’re so good, so indistinguishable from natural diamonds, that the next generation might not even know we once dug diamonds out of the ground.

As we look at monopolies that are not natural or regulated, we must understand they are all fragile. No monopoly is forever.