Manchester United shares
sank four percent in opening
US trade Wednesday after
the football club’s legendary
manager Alex Ferguson
announced his retirement.
In the early minutes of trade,
the shares, listed on the US
Nasdaq exchange by the
club’s US owners last year,
were off 4.1 percent to
$18.01.
Earlier Wednesday, the
Premier League champions
shocked the sporting world
when they announced that
Ferguson will retire at the
end of the season, ending
the most successful
managerial reign in English
football.
Ferguson, 71, guided United
to 13 Premier League titles
and two European
Champions League crowns in
26 years in charge at Old
Trafford.
He will remain at United as a
director and club
ambassador, and said he
was confident he was
stepping down with the
team in good shape.
“The decision to retire is one
that I have thought a great
deal about and one that I
have not taken lightly. It is
the right time,” Ferguson
said in a statement.
United, owned by the family
of US investor Malcolm Glazer,
did not immediately name a
replacement, but most
speculation focused on
Everton’s David Moyes to fill
Ferguson’s seat.
Despite the fall at the news,
the team’s shares were still
trading 27 percent above the
$14.00 initial public offering
price last August.
At that time the shares barely
treaded water amid worries
over the team’s ability to dig
out from under a pile of
debt.
But they rebounded
beginning in November with
improved quarterly profits
thanks to a slew of
sponsorship deals and huge
tax credits and a reduction
of their debt burden,
acquired in 2005 after the
Miami-based Glazers’ heavily
leveraged takeover.