CHELSEA’S new owners have agreed a staggering £800m debt package – but promised no negative impact on the club’s finances.
Chairman Todd Boehly and private investment firm Clearlake Capital inked a deal that will see them taking on a £500m loan plus a further £300m fund with the vow that it will be spent on players, rebuilding Stamford Bridge and academy projects.
Boehly had agreed to the funding targets as part of the £4.25bn takeover package when he replaced Roman Abramovich at the Blues helm.
But Boehly has guaranteed that none of the debt liabilities will be on the club and will instead be undertaken by himself and Clearlake.
That eases any fears from Blues fans that the new owners will be going down the Glazer route at Manchester United where a leveraged buy-out has seen the Old Trafford owners taking large dividend bonuses.
Instead, the new financial package is a halfway house between that model and the one underwritten by Abramovich, who lent the club £1.6bn during his 19 years in charge of the club.
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Boehly and his backers pledged £1.75bn towards infrastructure and squad funds as a condition of the deal with Abramovich’s appointed brokers, the US-based Raine Group, with £2.5bn the asking price for the club itself.
The sale had golden handcuffs restricting debt levels being imposed on the club.
It is understood that the £500m – forwarded by institutions including Bank of America and financial behemoth JP Morgan – will go towards those funding promises, with the extra £300m for “working capital purposes”.
The new Blues bosses have started to splash the cash with the captures of £50m Raheem Sterling and £34m Kalidou Koulibaly and the imminent arrival of £51m Sevilla defender Jules Kounde.
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SunSport has been told that the new owners plan a staged rebuild of the Bridge, with the stands replaced and upgraded one by one and the hotel behind the Shed End also being bulldozed.
That is in contrast to the intended Abramovich plan of a £1.4bn total rebuild which was planned to take four years before being junked in 2018 after the Russian billionaire was told his UK “golden visa” would not be renewed.
Boehly and Co believe the US is the market with the most potential growth for the club but also intend investments in technology and media content.
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