Valuation of Football Clubs a Thesis on Valuation of Danish Football Clubs
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Copenhagen Business School, Cand.Merc., Master´s Thesis Valuation of Football Clubs A thesis on valuation of Danish football clubs Jakob Dalsø (FIR): 102150 Casper Friis Jensen (ASC): 101233 Guidance Counselor: Michael E. Jacobsen Characters: 271,451 Pages: 120 Date: 15-05-2020 Valuation of Football Clubs J. Dalsø & C.F. Jensen Copenhagen Business School Abstract There are an increasing number of takeovers in the football industry. However, the science of valuating foot- ball clubs is not clear. Therefore, this thesis seeks to detect, which valuations methods are most optimal, when valuing Danish football clubs from the two highest leagues in Denmark. The purpose is to ease the valuation in a takeover scenario or as a stakeholder in a football club. To investigate the problem, a deductive method has been preferred. The theories of Discounted Cash Flows, multiples, and real option are therefore tested on a sample of 25 Danish football clubs. To support the tests, an analyzes of accounting differences and the Danish football industry, has been made. These analyses were based on different sources, as annual report, semi-structured interviews, articles etc. The key findings were that a general DCF approach could not be applied, while a tailored DCF approach yielded a satisfying result. In this method unstable business ele- ments were valued with a real options approach separately. It was only performed on one club, which made the result insignificant. Lastly, a multiples method was conducted, where revenue multiples yielded partly satisfying results. However, the peer group and the sample were not perfectly comparable, and optimally the peer group should be tailored for every club in the sample. All approaches consisted of several biases and estimations, as for example estimations of financial leasing of stadiums and estimations of transfer rights. The conclusion of the thesis is that no optimal approach was detected for valuating every club in a general manner, due to several biases and high volatility in income sources from year to year. However, if tailored for the specific club, both the multiples and DCF can possibly be applied, but the results were insignificant. For future research, a further analysis of the tailored DCF approach combined with real options could be made for every club, to test its significance. Moreover, other valuation theories can be tested. 1 Valuation of Football Clubs J. Dalsø & C.F. Jensen Copenhagen Business School Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................................................. 1 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 4 1.1 Problem Area ........................................................................................................................................... 4 1.2 Problem Statement ................................................................................................................................. 5 1.3 Delimitation ............................................................................................................................................. 5 1.4 Relevance................................................................................................................................................. 7 1.5 Methodology ........................................................................................................................................... 8 1.6 Structure ................................................................................................................................................ 10 2. Theoretical Presentation of Different Valuation Methods...................................................................... 11 2.1 Discounted Cash Flow ............................................................................................................................ 11 2.2 Multiples ................................................................................................................................................ 14 3. Accounting Differences ........................................................................................................................... 16 3.1 General challenges ................................................................................................................................ 17 3.2 Pension .................................................................................................................................................. 18 3.3 Revenue ................................................................................................................................................. 18 3.4 Revenue estimation ............................................................................................................................... 19 3.5 Stadium leasing adjustment .................................................................................................................. 21 3.6 Sub conclusion ....................................................................................................................................... 27 4. The Danish Football Club Industry ........................................................................................................... 28 4.1 Sources of income ................................................................................................................................. 28 4.2 Growth in Danish club football .............................................................................................................. 32 4.3 Risk ......................................................................................................................................................... 37 4.3.1 Business risk .................................................................................................................................... 37 4.3.2 Financial risk ................................................................................................................................... 41 4.4 Ownership ............................................................................................................................................. 45 4.5 Sub conclusion ....................................................................................................................................... 47 5. Reorganization of Financial Statements .................................................................................................. 48 6. DCF valuation ........................................................................................................................................... 51 6.1 The Analytical statement ....................................................................................................................... 51 6.2 Revenue Driven Forecasting .................................................................................................................. 55 6.3 Cash flow statement .............................................................................................................................. 57 6.4 Estimating WACC ................................................................................................................................... 58 2 Valuation of Football Clubs J. Dalsø & C.F. Jensen Copenhagen Business School 6.4.1 NIBL ................................................................................................................................................. 59 6.4.2 Equity .............................................................................................................................................. 60 6.4.3 Required rate of return on debt ..................................................................................................... 62 6.4.4 Required rate of return on equity .................................................................................................. 65 6.4.5 Results on WACC ............................................................................................................................ 73 6.5 Estimating Growth ................................................................................................................................. 74 6.6 Calculating the DCF ................................................................................................................................ 76 6.7 Sensitivity Analysis ................................................................................................................................. 77 6.8 DCF results ............................................................................................................................................. 80 6.9 Line-by-line forecasting ......................................................................................................................... 83 6.10 Sub conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 85 7. DCF and Real Option valuation ................................................................................................................ 85 7.1 Correction of the financial statement ................................................................................................... 86 7.2 Adjusting the value drivers ...................................................................................................................