At one time there was a unit trust based on football club shares after a number of clubs floated on the stock market. It wasn’t a great success because most football clubs don’t make any money or at least don’t pay dividends to their shareholders so there is no income stream. As far as capital appreciation was concerned, the shares of many clubs tanked. Nowadays there are too few quoted clubs to provide a basis for such a vehicle even if it made financial sense.
At one time there was a unit trust based on football club shares after a number of clubs floated on the stock market. It wasn’t a great success because most football clubs don’t make any money or at least don’t pay dividends to their shareholders so there is no income stream. As far as capital appreciation was concerned, the shares of many clubs tanked. Nowadays there are too few quoted clubs to provide a basis for such a vehicle even if it made financial sense.
However, Societé Générale have just launched the first-ever football tracker fund. Perhaps they have looked at France’s 28-1 odds of winning the World Cup. Anyway, SG Football 2010 will track the performance of an equally weighted basket of 16 stocks that have delivered the most consistent performance during past World Cups. SG’s analysts have measured share price movements during the past five tournaments, in the three- and six-month periods prior to the start of the competition and for one-, three and six-month periods afterwards. To qualify, stocks had to outperform the DJ Stoxx 600 Index at least 60 per cent of the time.
No big surprise to learn that the top performers were in the beverages, food producer and retail sectors: Heineken, Carlsberg, Diageo, Whitbread, Wm. Morrison, Tesco and J Sainsbury. One of the difficult calculations is how well England will do. The further they go, the more beer will be drunk and the more snacks consumed in front of the television.
This news item shows what a broad impact the World Cup has. It does not constitute a recommendaion to buy this product and anyone contemplating a financial investment of any kind should seek advice from a qualified professional financial adviser.