New Blog Banner and St Andrews

Mrs H. and I were driving home from a lovely weekend in St Andrews with Mr & Mrs K. and stopped to take the photo in the banner of this typical Lammermuirs spring scene. Hefted sheep on the hills and the burning of the heather.

On a Sunday there's no golf played on the famous Old Course at St. Andrews. people are free to walk it and so we did, all the way out on the front nine and back on the back nine. It was a glorious, but breezy day. It's well worth doing if you are interested in golf or not as you get some great views on the first 9 holes as you approach the water at the around holes 7 and 8. Coming back you get this famous view of the R & A Golf Club (the building on the far left) and a property (the dark red building on the right) that is currently standing empty but it would make a wonderful boutique hotel or apartments. The American owner of the property had intended converting it into a luxury time share in which a two week stay was going to cost something more than the Panamanian national debt – the developer has gone bankrupt.

World Class Golf Resort in the Rough

. . . and no it's not the Donald's

The multi-million pound celebrity golf resort on the Ury Estate, near Stonehaven is under threat as the Edinburgh-based FM Group of companies, which includes the firm behind the golf course project, FM Developments, has called in the administrators..

Jack Nicklaus had been due to open a £40m ‘world-class’ course in time for 2010 season; it’s Nicklaus that has designed the course. According to the administrator "We're firmly committed to exploring the future options available for the group's developments and in particular the ambitious plans for the Ury Estate and its proposed Jack Nicklaus Signature golf course. The Ury Estate is a stone’s throw from the Donald's ‘billion-pound’ development.

Oh Dear What Can The Matter Be? Trumptown Latest.

Back in November 2008 the man who runs Billionaire Donald Trump's Scottish operation said that he had a billion £. "The money is there, ready to be wired at any time. I am not discussing where it is, whether it is in a Scottish bank or what, but it is earmarked for this project. If we needed to put the development up tomorrow, we have the cash to do that. It is sitting there in the bank and is ready to go."

Well there's news this morning that might make that a little more difficult to believe. According to Reuters. "Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc , Donald Trump's casino group, is expected to file Tuesday for bankruptcy, The Wall Street Journal reported. The company's board was scheduled to meet late Monday night to decide whether to authorize the filing, the newspaper reported in its online edition. Otherwise, the casino operator would be forced into bankruptcy involuntarily by creditors, the newspaper said."

Unfortunately the timing of this little financial worry could not be worse. The Donald is about to start a new season of the Apprentice on American TV. Perhaps he'll fire himself? Oh he already has...

Because the Donald is no longer at the helm of his troubled casino operator – at the weekend he resigned. The resignation followed weeks of negotiations with bondholders to restructure debt. Apparently Trump could not come to terms with the company’s creditors in seeking to refinance $1.25 billion in debt owed by Trump Entertainment. He said bondholders would neither sell the company to him nor accept his offers to repay existing debt. “I strongly disagree with the bondholders’ decisions and actions. Part of the reason that these bondholders can’t make a deal is… they’ve lost so much money on this deal, and they’re probably going to lose so much money on other deals, that my impression is they don’t care.”

Trump who controls over a quarter of the company's stock has seen the value of his shares crash to around 25 cents each from $4 a year ago. Will this make him a nearly billionaire?

Bloomberg are reporting that Trump’s exit from the gaming company may endanger the sale of the Trump Marina Casino to Coastal Marina, a deal already entangled in financing problems. Trump Marina’s price had been lowered to $270 million, still quite a bit of cash for the cash-starved company.

Of course this is not the first time. Back in the early 1990s he almost went to the wall when his Atlantic City casino, it too cost a billion (do all his developments cost a billion?) and was built with money from high-interest junk bonds ran into trouble. Such was the level of debt servicing that was required that it ate through most of his companies cash and almost finished him. Trump had to file for bankruptcy protection.

Meanwhile according to the Herald this morning. Gordon Dewar, the secretary of the Scottish PGA, last night revealed that he had made an audacious bid to lure Donald Trump, the US tycoon, to the Tartan Tour as a sponsor for the Northern Open. The 72-hole championship, one of the oldest professional events in Scotland, will still go ahead in May despite losing the financial backing of the anonymous benefactor who has bankrolled the 78-year-old tournament for the past four years.

"We have a number of sponsorship options that we are working on but we thought it was worth giving the Trump idea a go," admitted Dewar after receiving news that his bold move had failed.
It was a case of nothing ventured, nothing gained and we did receive a response thanking us for our inquiry but that nothing would materialise."

So where does this leave the development of the greatest golf course in the world? Naturally complex corporate financial arrangements are at play and the Donald's golf and construction empire will be totally divorced from his gambling empire. But, who would still like to bet on there being a billion in the bank just ready and waiting to finance the Menie project? It's all pretty hair-raising

Trumparama

Aberdeen City Council is to allow the public another chance to vote on the design of a statue to commemorate Robert the Bruce following claims that the previous round of voting was "flawed". Meanwhile Aberdeenshire Council has rejected Trumparama by 8 votes to 7. What's interesting in all this is the fact that there are 40 councillors. Now it seems to me that something so significant should be decided upon by the whole council.

Meanwhile the Scotsman is running the headline 'Rejecting Trump's golf resort 'would deter global investment in Scotland' after a number of MSPs have branded the council as loony (or words to that effect). I have no doubt that it will be a blip on the graph of inward investment if it is rejected, but there seems little chance that it will be. More to the point is will it be a success. methinks Trump is bringing a US style golf resort and hosing complex to the UK and I'm not so sure the model will prove effective. Still it is his money....