Many of you have seen a story in this morning’s Sunday Times about our crowdfunding partners, Seedrs.
The article is confusing so we thought we’d clear up a few misconceptions with the following Q&A. The most important point, though, is this:
Our crowdfunding campaign is going extremely well, it’s in extremely safe hands and we need you to carry on backing it. Keep telling your friends, your family and everyone you know. We need you to Lead Us Home and the best way to do that is via this campaign so we can all get back to where we belong - Plough Lane and Wimbledon.
Q: Is the money I have spent to buy shares in AFC Wimbledon safe?
A: Absolutely yes. The money is held in what’s called an Escrow Account at one of the main High Street Banks. This is our money, it doesn’t belong to Seedrs. Every penny is safe and will go directly towards our move back to Plough Lane.
Q: I’m thinking of buying shares. Will I still be able to?
A: Absolutely yes. The campaign continues full steam ahead - but don’t delay because the clock is ticking.
Q: The Sunday Times said Seedrs shares have been suspended. Is this true?
A: Yes - but this is solely shares in Seedrs the business - not us - and it’s something they have chosen to do.
Q: Why have they done this?
A:Put simply, Seedrs are currently having conversations with investors to raise funds to expand their own business. They are in advanced talks with a major investor and so, out of protocol, they’ve stopped trading in their own shares while negotiations continue. This is only a temporary measure and the shares will return once their talks are over.
Q: Doesn’t this affect us, though?
A: No, not at all. It only effects Seedrs’ own shareholders, who trade their shares on something called the secondary market. Primary campaigns like ours are entirely separate from this.
Q: Could anything go wrong?
A: No, there is no worst-case scenario, other than Seedrs might not agree a deal with the investor they’re currently talking to. Again, that doesn’t impact on us, or our campaign, at all.
Seedrs have put out their own statement this afternoon, please see below:
Seedrs Statement:
We want to address the highly misleading Sunday Times article that ran this morning and clear up the substantial inaccuracies it contained.
When we released our 2018 Shareholders Report on 1st August, we announced that we are in advanced stages of finalising a new round of funding. Under the rules of our Secondary Market, we are required to declare a company ineligible as soon as it announces that it is in process of raising a funding round. We applied the rules to ourselves, just as we would with any company, and declared our shares ineligible for the August trading window. That is the only reason that they are not trading.
For the avoidance of any doubt, we are not running out of cash or close to it. However, in order to continue to deliver the 70% year-on-year growth we've been delivering over the past three years, we need to invest further capital in the business, and that is why we are raising additional capital. We will share details about our new raise as soon as it is finalised.
The platform is business as usual and you can read our 2018 Shareholders Report HERE.
You might also find this article in trade publication Crowdfund Insider, which was also published today and presents a substantially more accurate report on us, helpful background.
If you have any further questions please email support@seedrs.com