THE TROUBLES of private American financial group Mirabilis Ventures Inc are likely to cast a shadow over Tranmere Rovers’ annual general meeting this morning.
The gathering at Prenton Park (11am) gives shareholders in the League One club the chance to ask directors and officials about Tranmere’s relationship with Florida-based venture capitalists.
Tranmere are pursuing legal action against Mirabilis, claiming they breached a £900,000 loan agreement negotiated by chairman Lorraine Rogers last summer. The mortgage-type loan is secured against a portion of land on the car park at Prenton Park.
Mirabilis, facing lawsuits from a number of American companies who claim they failed to honour loan agreements, are also under Federal Grand Jury investigation in Florida over employment tax collection issues.
Tranmere supporters groups have voiced concern about the difficulties the club may be facing as a consequence of the affair.
Rogers has made little public comment about the issue, saying the club does not want to prejudice the legal action.
According to its founder, Frank L Amodeo, who served time in prison for a fraud-related conviction, Mirabilis was going to change the world. He once boasted: “I expect I’ll have offices within one hour of human life everywhere.”
But the group has been scaling back operations in recent weeks, closing offices, shedding staff and removing the names of directors, officials and employees from its website.
At the time the loan was arranged, Rogers said the American money would be used to finance the wage bill at Prenton Park this season, ensure investment in the youth set-up and pay for maintenance and improvements to the ground.
The first order of business for today’s meeting will be to adopt Tranmere’s financial report for the year ended June 30, 2006.
The figures show Rovers made an operating loss of £1.26million last season – down slightly on losses of £1.3m for the previous campaign.
However, transfer fees of £1.6m enabled Tranmere to record a pre-tax profit of just under £400,000 on the 2005-06 season.
The windfall came from the sale of England youth international Ryan Taylor to Premiership club Wigan Athletic, Canadian international striker Iain Hume to Leicester City and a more modest fee for striker Chris Dagnall, who joined Rochdale.
Turnover dropped by 16% and footballing income by 20% last season as Tranmere struggled against the threat of relegation in League One and made early exits from the major cup competitions, Rogers reported.
Average League attendances dropped from 9,044 in 2004-05 (when Tranmere finished third) to 7,213 last season (when Tranmere finished 18th).
Operating expenses were down by more than £600,000, helped in part by a drop in performance related bonuses paid to staff and players from £26, 2000 in 2004-05 to £5,000 last season.
Rogers paid tribute to the work of Tranmere’s commercial department for producing “exceptional results” in a “challenging year”.
