Editco.net

Manchester United’s plans to refinance its debts - estimated by some at £714m - through a high interest £500m bond issue are proceeding but not wholly according to the plan.

The club has found takers for the bonds but one half of the issue at least is already trading at just 93 per cent of the issue price indicating that the market thinks the buyers are suckers, high interest or not.

Here’s what the FT’s Alphaville newsletter makes of it:

“The first bond issue by English football club Manchester United has become one of the market’s worst performers this year barely two weeks after its launch. While the club secured the £500m funding it needs to refinance its bank debt, the paper losses suffered by investors could affect its ability to return to bond markets, after the bid price of its £250m of sterling-denominated bonds tumbled to just 93% of their face value.”

Well you have to hand it to Carl Johnson's New York and London agency Anomaly, it's the first 'integrated' agency that has actually demonstrated a bit of oomph and not been just an adman's approximation of what he or she thought clients wanted.

Now it's pinched Fallon London managing director Karina Wilsher just a few weeks after winning Fallon's flagship Sony account.

The acid test, of course, will be the first work it produces for Sony, following Fallon's much praised bouncing balls and all that stuff for the Japanese posh electronics market leader (albeit a somewhat uncertain one in recent years).