Thread by @Unity_MoT

Okay, so this is the key section from the Albion Assembly minutes dealing with the club's finances, in full, so let's break this down properly.

We start with the £4.95 million loan to Lai's Wisdom Smart, which we're still being assured will be repaid by the end of... /1 #WBA

...the year, with the funds being made available to strengthen the squad.

First, this is a clear test of Lai's credibility. If the loan isn't repaid then he has none, simple as.

If it isn't repaid then it's difficult to see where Gourlay goes from there. I can't see... /2 #WBA

...his position as CEO being at all tenable if Lai cuts his legs put from under him by not repaying the loan.

Second, even if the loan is repaid, £5m is not that much to play with in a January transfer market. Unless we're shopping in the lower leagues for more... /3 #WBA

...BTA-type deals, then £5m is going to cover maybe one permanant deal, or a couple of loans, or a dip in the free agent market for 2-3 players, with all the problems that brings in trying to get them to the right levels of fitness.

What this means is that we won't... /4 #wba

...know if the loan has been repaid without some communication from the club, if not direct to supporters then through either the Albion Assembly or the independent shareholders, although Gourlay resigning as CEO would be a pretty clear sign that it hasn't been paid.

.../5 #WBA

We also can't infer anything about repayment based on transfer activity, or a lack thereof, in the January window. Even if the money is available to Corberan, it's not going to buy a lot and we may still need to offload players to create space in the squad and on the... /6 #WBA

...wage bill.

I shouldn't really need to point that out but I expect we all know that - unless there's a clear statement from the club one way or the other - the more gullible elements of our Twitter fanbase are inevitably going to start jumping to all sorts of... /7 #WBA

...wild conclusions based on the crap posted by so-called ITKs.

The independent shareholders' investigation into the loan that Lai inherited from JP is what it is. The question that seems to be being asked by shareholders is whether or not JP used money borrowed from... /8 #WBA

...the club to increase the size of his shareholding and, ultimately, the size of his payout when the club was sold.

I have no idea if that's the case - that's what the investigation is for - but I will predict that whatever the investigation turns up, it will have... /9 #WBA

...all been perfectly legal at the time.

Perhaps the one question the investigation might usefully examine is that of why the outstanding loan wasn't priced into the deal to buy the club in the first place, so that it was automatically repaid when the deal went... /10 #WBA

...through, even if the only answer turns out to be that its because JP had Lai's pants down when he sold him the club.

That brings us to the proposed £15-25m loan, which actually looks more like a loan facility than a straight loan - so we have an agreement that we... /11 #wba

...can borrow up to, say, £25m but we only have to repay what we actually use (plus interest, of course) meaning that, if we run a tighter budget we can borrow less and have to repay less.

What seems clear from the minutes that this loan doesn't appear to relate to... /12 #WBA

...covering the running costs of the club this season - we should have that covered by the last year of our parachute payments. What we're talking about here is borrowing to cover our running costs for next season if we don't get promotion this season.

At this... /13 #WBA

...stage - it looks like contingency planning for next season.

We're not borrowing to stay afloat and pay the bills but we may - and likely will - have to borrow if we're to keep our key players, and our manager, if we not promoted this.

Don't forget, the main.... /14 #WBA

...reason that Corberan appears to have walked out on Huddersfield appears to have been that they decided to sell some of his key players out from under him just to cover the bills.

If we don't get back in the PL this season, we'll be in the same position, unless we... /15 #WBA

...can bring in £15-20m over the summer just cover our wage bill and running costs for next season.

That, unfortunately, means borrowing - because we know Lai isn't going to invest his own money - unless we can generate somewhere around £50-70m from player sales,... /16 #wba

..., which would give us £15-20m in up-front payment or £15-25m in player sales that we can use as collateral for a loan in the same way we borrowed against Craig Dawson's transfer to Watford.

Unless there's an FFP issue in the pipeline that we're unaware of, we're... /17 #WBA

...not in a promotion or bust situation this season, but if we're not promoted then we face a choice at the end of the season of borrowing to retain our key players and have another - hopefully - realistic shot at promotion, or we sell players like Dike, Diangana,... /18 #WBA

...Wallace, etc, and try to rebuild on a vastly lower budget than we've had for many years with, in all likelihood, a new manager given what happened with Corberan and Huddersfield.

Our situation isn't dire - yet - but it could go that way.

#WBA

@threadreaderapp unroll