City: who are the investors then?

The club's official site has statements from both Peter Ridsdale and Sam Hammam.

The most revealing comments today are by Peter Ridsdale in the Guardian:

Before I joined the club Sam [Hammam] put the debt into loan notes - they are through a company in Switzerland and the identity of those loan holders have always been in question," Ridsdale said. "Clearly I don't know who they were because I wasn't there when the loan note debt was organised but by doing this now it takes away that stumbling block."

The fact that Cardiff have no knowledge of the identity of their loan holders is certain to raise eyebrows. "We will ensure that when we have got the money to pay it off we find out who they are and pay whoever is the owner of them," Ridsdale added. "This forces their identity. We will be running this club as a public company, it will be transparent and I think that is the only way to manage any business.

Referring to the club's debt he said: "The hedge funds will be paying off a chunk of it and the rest has already been identified as to how we are paying it off through our new stadium project. We will end up within 12 months with a debt-free business and a new stadium."

I hope that commitment to transparency, and to forcing out the identity of the loan-notes holders, will address the questions Paul Young rightly raises in his comment on my post below.

In the Western Mail Ridsdale says that they don't want their identities known yet, but since he says they are to become the majority shareholders, unless they plan to own the club through a network of off-shore holdings their identities should be come known.