A company in Chapter 11 – administration to us Brits – usually has equity that’s worth nothing. Not a bean. Because, you know, it’s bust? This isn’t true of Cineworld (CINE) because the shares are liquid, in size, at 2.6 pence or so (at pixel time).
As Cineworld shares aren’t worth nothing then Cineworld shares aren’t worth nothing – can’t argue with that, the market is always right.
Prime Minister Jeremy Hunt’s forthcoming 30% corporation tax rise (because fuck you, that’s why) should be very effective in killing off any stragglers in the British economy.
Assuming he doesn’t kill them off in another lockdown first.
Steve, no the punters will pay for that. Shareholders. All the pension funds who thought the budget was dangerous. But not, however, those bastards who are levelling taxes across countries without any mandate.
Steve,
Recessions have always been good for cinema. People need cheering up and it’s a cheaper thing to have a night at the movies than spending £45K on a new shiny Deano car like a Q5.
Rhoda, BoM4 – in the olden days when the pictures was a relatively cheap form of entertainment with fewer rivals, sure.
Cinema is no longer cheap. For the price of one cinema ticket a month, you can pay for your Netflix subscription. Taking a couple of kids and buying them hotdogs and popcorn starts getting expensive fast.
When they try to raise prices, they’ll just lose more customers to cheaper digital alternatives.
PS – Prime Minister Jeremy Hunt just announced that the energy price guarantee will be ending in April, and not 2024 as Liz Truss had promised.
Welcome to £6,000 a year energy bills by the spring, with no fracking on the horizon to lower those costs, lol. He also knifed the IR35 reforms so Rishi’s wife can continue making millions replacing British staff with incompetent Indian outsourcees.
People will be too busy trying to find a pot to piss in to worry about seeing Black Panther 2 in the IMAX. But maybe we can use the abandoned cinemas to house all the asylum seekers the government “can’t” stop coming here.
Thanks, Conservatives!
FFS. That was the last good part left in the quasi-budget.
IR35 is why I was already never voting tory ever again, even before lockdown.
“Cinema is no longer cheap. For the price of one cinema ticket a month, you can pay for your Netflix subscription. Taking a couple of kids and buying them hotdogs and popcorn starts getting expensive fast.
When they try to raise prices, they’ll just lose more customers to cheaper digital alternatives.”
OK, but Disney DVDs were always cheaper than a cinema trip. The shift in the sort of films that make it big at the cinema changed as buying DVDs became a thing (so people stopped going to see films like Rain Man and waited for DVD).
Cinema is a going out thing. Like pubs, cafes and Nandos. You can do all of those things at home, but people go out to do them socially. Married couples probably stay home and drink a bottle of Pinot Grigio, in the same way that they watch a Jane Austen adaptation. But other people meet up with friends to watch a movie, or to ask out a date.
Some of us just like the visual/sounds. I don’t have OLED or a 5:1 system at home, I have a Cineworld card instead. It’ll take me a decade of use before it catches up with the cost of those.
According to Electoral Calculus’s predictions, based on opinion polls from 05 Oct 2022 to 14 Oct 2022, Labour will win 507 seats, while Conservatives will only get 48, losing the title of Official Opposition to SNP.
Thanks, Conservatives!
BoM4 – I’m not expecting this to be a “normal” recession, it’s shaping up to be one of them once in a century Happenings that leaves a cultural imprint on succeeding generations (and I’m being optimistic here).
With the cost of everything racing far ahead of pay increases, and the government now killing off any chance of green shoots by 2024, I think the Pictures is going to go the way of the Discotheque, the Videogame Arcade or the Laser Tag. Not that we need David Mamet or Nolan Bushnell when we already have ringside seats to a densely plotted black comedy playing out in SW1 for free.
Apart from that, everything’s great.
I’ve a crisp new Turing here that says the Tories will get over 100 seats next election. What odds will you give me, Steve?
Cineworld is going to die.
Not necessarily because cinemas are a thing of the past. There’s the bit where they offer an “experience” that, as pointed out above, you simply can’t get at home. ( well… not without having some words with the Neighbours about soundproofing..).
And it’s not the cost v/s streaming/dvd. People will pay for an “Experience”, or to sort-of-shut-up 15+ kids, quite happily.
The thing here is that the main provider of Experiences for the western market, “Hollywood”, has become a lackluster, Woke, creatively dried-up parody of its heighdays.
And people obviously don’t want to pay a premium for that Experience, so they’ll wait for the streaming/dvd offering ( possibly in the Bargain Bin three months later ) if they really want to know what a movie is about.
It’s not Cinepolis, it’s the quality of stuff that comes down the supply chain that isn’t worth peoples’ time and money.
And that’s not going to change any time soon, so Cinepolis is a lost cause.
According to Electoral Calculus’s predictions, based on opinion polls from 05 Oct 2022 to 14 Oct 2022 . . .
Election “predictions” based on contemporary popularity polling are always bollocks. Good for pearl clutchers.
“Election “predictions” based on contemporary popularity polling are always bollocks. Good for pearl clutchers.”
Yep, one of the things Tim has taught us is that revealed preferences will always beat polling and questionnaires.
Chris – hang on to it, by 2024 that £100 could buy you 20 Lambert and Butler or half a tank of diesel.
PJF – it’s a poll of polls study based on opinion polls taken over the past week or so, so obviously it’s not likely to translate into accurate numbers.
But the underlying message from the polls is still true: the Conservative Party is now somewhat less popular than bowel cancer and – barring some unlikely realignment of the fates – is going to be absolutely fucked by the electorate. It’s a bit like what happened to the Lib Dems after their stint in government, they’ve managed to make themselves completely radioactive.
Not sure to what degree it matters if Sir Keir Starmer gets a majority of 300 seats or “only” about 100, except to the surviving Tory backbenchers. Labour is going to win, and it looks like the Conservative Party is keen to help them win.
– When they try to raise prices, they’ll just lose more customers to cheaper digital alternatives.
There’s a lot of subscription cancelling going on, so I think both may be on their way out. Things like YouTube might do well.
– OK, but Disney DVDs were always cheaper than a cinema trip.
Amusingly, Disney doesn’t offer DVDs of its Disney+ tv shows. So the pirates are. You can even buy DVDs of the various Star Wars shows in the Amazon Prime store. Disney (wankers) makes fuck all out of these transactions but Bezos does.
Chris has it. The polls might look bad now but an election concentrates minds a bit. They will still lose badly though unless they all get behind the next leader with no infighting (fat chance!), and can pull an economic rabbit out of the hat.
Trouble is, I don’t think Labour could do the economy job any better, and more than likely much worse. Plus very large helpings of PC crap, as if that could be any worse.
PJF – I think both may be on their way out. Things like YouTube might do well.
There’s been a gold rush of companies desperate to get a slice of the streaming market, especially in the US. I reckon you’re right that there’s going to be consolidation. Cinemas have also been complaining for years about Disney taking more and more of their profits.
TG – the trouble is more fundamental than which set of idiots gets to sit in the cockpit while what’s left of Britain flies directly into a mountainside.
The pilots and cabin crew have rebelled against the passengers and no longer pretend to care about our preference of destination. In-flight catering just got cancelled and replaced with shit sandwiches and beatings all round.
The significance of the coup is that the great British public just got cancelled by our betters. What they’re doing to Truss now is what they were planning all along during those interminable months while Liz thought she was “winning” the leadership election. Sunak was soundly rejected by Conservative Party members and proved unpopular with the general public, so the Conservative Party has rejected the decision of its members and is sticking two fingers up at the public.
What the public wants is no longer relevant to what Cabinet decides. We’re moving very rapidly towards something more like China’s system of government, with fortified elections offering a choice between Ruling Elite Functionary #1 and Ruling Elite Functionary #2.
We’ve just been disenfranchised, effectively. But I’m sure we’ll hear about how we need to vote Conservative for fear of Labour.
Labour is going to win, and it looks like the Conservative Party is keen to help them win.
On current performance, I agree. But things are so volatile in the Tories at the moment that I wouldn’t be surprised if Hunt quickly takes Kwasi’s record, and I don’t mean by suddenly becoming PM. The obvious electoral consequences of his announcements will cause way more panic in the back benches than the phony market bullshit from the Blob.
If the Tories can sort themselves out without prompting an early election then there’s a sliver of hope, particularly if the discipline of the Labour leadership falls apart (as it is itching to do).
The pilots and cabin crew have rebelled against the passengers and no longer pretend to care about our preference of destination.
You’ve just told us that the passengers overwhelmingly want the plane taken to Cuba . . .
PJF – If the Tories can sort themselves out without prompting an early election then there’s a sliver of hope
There’s more chance of Gary Glitter getting a Christmas Number One.
You’ve just told us that the passengers overwhelmingly want the plane taken to Cuba . . .
Did I? I don’t think I did. Joe Public doesn’t think Kier Starmer is a communist. Joe Public barely thinks about Starmer at all – Labour is winning because the Tories have completely destroyed the economy.
It’s true the public wants fried ice, for free. Democracy, in a system where people can vote themselves other people’s money, is always going to have problems with free riders and general stupidity. The (very successful) campaigns to frighten people about fracking and atomic power speak to the shortcomings of deciding things via election.
But this is still infinitely preferable to voters being shut out of the decision making process altogether, and being given the run around by self-appointed “elites” who only want to do things the IMF, EU and WEF also want. Because those things are literally insane.
The announcement that the energy price guarantee is being scrapped by early next year is huge. There’s no chance of bills coming down to liveable levels in the next 6 months.
I think we’re going to see a rapid acceleration in the number of SME’s going broke and big corps outsourcing all the FTE’s they can pay an Indian to undertake. Retail, Hospitality and Manufacturing will be the first casualties, but there’ll be plenty of carnage to go about. Things will get so bad on the High Street we’ll probably see even the charity shops driven out of physical premises.
The announcement that the energy price guarantee is being scrapped by early next year is huge.
Our host should be pleased.
Grikath,
“The thing here is that the main provider of Experiences for the western market, “Hollywood”, has become a lackluster, Woke, creatively dried-up parody of its heighdays.
And people obviously don’t want to pay a premium for that Experience, so they’ll wait for the streaming/dvd offering ( possibly in the Bargain Bin three months later ) if they really want to know what a movie is about.”
I would say that Disney+ is probably worse than their movies. Amazon’s Rings of Power too. But yeah, modern Star Wars and late era Marvel.
But there’s a lot of movies that aren’t. And the woke *message* movies have all lost money, which is ultimately what Hollywood cares about. The losses on Ghostbusters 2016 led to the head of Sony Pictures getting fired, and the whole franchise was rebooted. No-one is making a sequel to the latest Charlie’s Angels movie.
Hollywood still makes some great movies. Top Gun:Maverick was awesome. And I don’t really care for the original.
But yeah, modern Star Wars . . .
TV Star Wars is way ahead of the Disney movie sequels. Not fantastic but not utter shit.
PJF,
I tried an episode of The Mandalorian, and it was well, it was there. I don’t get the fuss about most of this long-form TV though. It seems to take an age to get to any point. TV was better when it was 30 minute episodes like Frasier.
I tried an episode of The Mandalorian, and it was well, it was there.
That’s kind of it. In terms of being Star Wars it was at least there, whereas the movie sequels weren’t.
Can’t say I agree on long form TV. In fact, I tend not to watch episodically, preferring a massive “box-set” binge. A lot does go on far too long, that’s for sure. But stuff like “Preacher” or “The Boys” leaves me wanting more. The best season of The Walking Dead is the first at six episodes.
It’s not just films. To prepare for next week’s Dr Who special I watched the last episode of the last season, thinking I had missed it. I got to a point where I was sure my internet connection had skipped, I seemed to have missed huge chunks of plot. I rewound it, but there was still no plot. From all the explosions I concluded they’d spent all the budget on the effects and forgotten to do any writing. One hour seemed to contain barely enough content for a “previously…” recap.
What will the next election look like if Farage returns?
What will the next election look like if Farage returns?
But if people vote for Farage’s outfit, Labour might get in!
Haha.
Anyway, it’s unlikely Nigel Farage can make a perceptible difference on the next election, apart from maybe soliciting some fresh Tory pledges to stop the dinghies (lol).
The Conservative Party is like cancer: one of those unpleasant things that sometimes happens in life and requires serious attention. But nobody really cares what happens to cancer after it’s excised.
No fucking flowers.
Lots of comments on politics here. But back to the topic posted by Tim.
In the US, Chapter 11 is the financial reorganisation of the firm in bankruptcy. Now, while there is supposedly strict rules about how this works and–in law and theory–the equity (stock/shareholders) should be wiped out, in most practical cases with big firms, the shareholders actually emerge with something.
The stock price not being zero reflects that in the reorgination the existing shareholders are likely to emerge with something, rather than zero, and hence the price reflects that expectation. It is low because the amount they will get will be pretty insubstantial and there is, as always, the risk the settlement between the different parties actually leaves them with nothing.
So, all in all, a wonderful cluckfest of different claimants on the firms jostling for position. In this game, for instance, certain debtholders might buy up the equity as punt and push for existing equityholders to get something.
All fund and games really.
– Lots of comments on politics here.
Sir, Steve started it!
Sometimes I think Tim should just do a sandbox post each day, but then there’s a bit of fun in finding under which post the shit-fest is developing. I expect the OT is annoying on pet projects but the organic conversations hopefully compensate.