Game Discussions Star Citizen Discussion Thread v12

[LittleAnt]

Put it this way, if it was discovered that the CIG board were giving themselves dividends before releasing a game then backers should be morally outraged. I say should be, because they would probably just throw more money at CIG and absolve them.

I just said that FDEV had a board too, nothing more. It seems to have trigerred you, as if you had something to blame them for
And the board of directors of CIG taking dividends before the release of a game does not shock me. They don't live on love and fresh water, CIG is a commercial company not a charity business.

 

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FD - a profitable company with many years of successfully released games with more games coming out soon.

CIG - a company with zero profits*, no released products, entirely dependent on the goodwill and funding of backers.

Put it this way, if it was discovered that the CIG board were giving themselves dividends before releasing a game then backers should be morally outraged. I say should be, because they would probably just throw more money at CIG and absolve them.

* - use the term loosely here, but profit as in they are not generating any revenue from a released product. They are to-date running entirely on debt - money given, product still owed.

Dividends are payouts on profits. Profit that isn't attributed to the companies equity. A company that hasn't earned any profits can't pay out dividends, that'd be taking from equity belonging to the shareholders and giving it to the shareholders. What they can do is raise their salaries and boni, however.

 

[Xink]

Again, what other companies do or not do is irrelevant. Especially publicly traded ones.

 

[Coloratura]

I just said that FDEV had a board too, nothing more. It seems to have trigerred you, as if you had something to blame them for
And the board of directors of CIG taking dividends before the release of a game does not shock me. They don't live on love and fresh water, CIG is a commercial company not a charity business.

Well, no, it's an important point. FDev is an actual published developer. They have released multiple games, some quite popular, and have a clear record of starting and completing tasks. So when they have board meetings, it is safe to accept the notion that they will be furthering ideas on projects they wish to complete in addition to the projects they have already completed, released, and have received returns upon.

CiG, on the other hand, has completed nothing. They go through the motions that FDev go through, but what are they actually doing? After 10 years they have released nothing complete. If they're giving themselves more money, money made from backers donations based on the promise of a project that has blown through every promised release date by YEARS, then yeah, people should be upset. They're not a charity, but they exist because they live on the charity of their backers.

 

[Darkfyre99]

Put it this way, if it was discovered that the CIG board were giving themselves dividends before releasing a game then backers should be morally outraged. I say should be, because they would probably just throw more money at CIG and absolve them.

The key word is “should be.” But despite all the visible profiteering the Roberts Clan are doing in their UK shell companies alone, which are the only shells that are required by law to be open about that kind of thing… the backers still aren’t outraged.

Boggles the mind…

 

[Darkfyre99]

I just said that FDEV had a board too, nothing more. It seems to have trigerred you, as if you had something to blame them for
And the board of directors of CIG taking dividends before the release of a game does not shock me. They don't live on love and fresh water, CIG is a commercial company not a charity business.

Until they’ve fulfilled their promises to their backers, they’re not a commercial company. They’re a crowd-funded one.

 

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Until they’ve fulfilled their promises to their backers, they’re not a commercial company. They’re a crowd-funded one.

Not sure what the difference is. I always assumed they are companies like any other only funded with grey market equity.

 

[dayrth]

I just said that FDEV had a board too, nothing more. It seems to have trigerred you, as if you had something to blame them for
And the board of directors of CIG taking dividends before the release of a game does not shock me. They don't live on love and fresh water, CIG is a commercial company not a charity business.

You may not understand what dividends are. They are extra payments on top of the wages the directors get paid. The board of a company normally award themselves such dividends as a bonus when the company is making a hansom profit. Some (maybe less scrupulous) boards award themselves dividends regardless of how well the company is doing to give themselves extra money without letting the punters know (and avoid some tax).

 

[LittleAnt]

Until they’ve fulfilled their promises to their backers, they’re not a commercial company. They’re a crowd-funded one.

Like when you promise ship interiors in your kickstarter ?

 

[VR Golgot]

I just said that FDEV had a board too, nothing more. It seems to have trigerred you, as if you had something to blame them for

You tried another simplistic attempt at casting CIG as normal, in an area where they are abnormal (in a negative sense). You do this a lot.

Agony doesn't seem triggered to me. He's just pointing out why your drive-by statement was daft. It's a service the thread provides for you on a regular basis

And the board of directors of CIG taking dividends before the release of a game does not shock me. They don't live on love and fresh water, CIG is a commercial company not a charity business.

They could live on their very generous salaries...

We know that Erin took home £283K (+ 10k pension contribution) in 2019 for example. A rise of £40K on 2018.

What have they done that would warrant a dividend on top? They still haven't shipped a product. They certainly haven't hit any of their major milestones (oh 4.0, SQ42, where art thou...?). And the business itself runs at an annual loss (-$7M & -$10M in the last two financial years), hence the need for angel investors.

Chris has already received bonus cash to the tune of at least $3M, from the share sales to the Calders. (And potentially as much as $7M all told).

That's a lot of money theoretically earmarked for development and marketing walking off there already. Any dividend would be backer cash sloshing in a similar direction. Away from making the games...

 

[cigwatch]

You may not understand what dividends are. They are extra payments on top of the wages the directors get paid.

To be more precise, shareholders. It is quite often the case in private companies that directors are shareholders but these are two different roles. Directors decide on dividends, shareholders receive them.

 

[VR Golgot]

Like when you promise ship interiors in your kickstarter ?

Ingeniously they didn't put a timeframe on delivery there. Chris should really have tried that

The 2 DLC expansions they have provided to date (landable planets, and FPS gameplay), will have to suffice for now, as deliveries, and as proof of intent. If they close down ED without attempting to add that tech, they will doubtless feel the wrath of those who pre-ordered. Time will tell.

It does have some of the carrot-dangling of CIG's own excesses, for sure. A future nirvana, to maintain current interest. But a key point in their favour, comparatively, is that they haven't perpetually monetised this dangled carrot of future functionality. They sold lifetime passes during pre-launch, and prior to the launch of the first DLC. And that was it.

Its artificial scarcity, but not as we know it

 

[Phlegm]

You may not understand what dividends are. They are extra payments on top of the wages the directors get paid. The board of a company normally award themselves such dividends as a bonus when the company is making a hansom profit. Some (maybe less scrupulous) boards award themselves dividends regardless of how well the company is doing to give themselves extra money without letting the punters know (and avoid some tax).

*handsome profit

A hansom is a type of horse-drawn carriage.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

And the board of directors of CIG taking dividends before the release of a game does not shock me. They don't live on love and fresh water, CIG is a commercial company not a charity business.

You seem to be confusing salary with dividends. We know CR takes home a nice fat salary based on his brother's published earnings.

Dividends are usually paid out to shareholder for higher than expected earnings. Not something i would say CIG should be considering. Although Calder and the other investors have seats on the board and could vote for dividends to be paid.

But remember the pledge, all money earned goes towards development of the game. No paying additional money to the board of directors.

Wait, what was it i said?

then backers should be morally outraged. I say should be, because they would probably just throw more money at CIG and absolve them.

Well, that didn't take long did it?

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Dividends are payouts on profits. Profit that isn't attributed to the companies equity. A company that hasn't earned any profits can't pay out dividends, that'd be taking from equity belonging to the shareholders and giving it to the shareholders. What they can do is raise their salaries and boni, however.

I'm no big fancy pants lawyer or accountant, but i don't think there is anything stopping them from giving themselves dividends if they chose. They have cash.... at least some.

"equity belonging to the shareholders"

They are 100% of the shareholders. If all the shareholders vote yes, then they can do it. Pretty certain. Maybe you know the actual rules governing this though and can show they can't.

But as you noted, they could also vote to raise their salaries.

 

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You may not understand what dividends are. They are extra payments on top of the wages the directors get paid. The board of a company normally award themselves such dividends as a bonus when the company is making a hansom profit. Some (maybe less scrupulous) boards award themselves dividends regardless of how well the company is doing to give themselves extra money without letting the punters know (and avoid some tax).

shrug Here dividends are cash payouts per share, not wage boni.

 

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I'm no big fancy pants lawyer or accountant, but i don't think there is anything stopping them from giving themselves dividends if they chose. They have cash.... at least some.

"equity belonging to the shareholders"

They are 100% of the shareholders. If all the shareholders vote yes, then they can do it. Pretty certain. Maybe you know the actual rules governing this though and can show they can't.

But as you noted, they could also vote to raise their salaries.

In my country it's illegal to pay dividends from a company in deficit. When there is no profit to distribute - there can't be dividends.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Like when you promise ship interiors in your kickstarter ?

Are we doing whaboutism again?

Didn't your mother teach you that two wrongs don't make a right?

 

[Agony_Aunt]

In my country it's illegal to pay dividends from a company in deficit. When there is no profit to distribute - there can't be dividends.

USA! USA! USA!

The country where corporations make the laws!

Also, again, we are in a bit of a grey area regarding profit. We don't know CIG's financials for this year, but as long as money in > money out then they can claim to have made a profit, regardless of not delivering a product to market. Well, unless we count Chris' "playable now narrative"

EDIT: Personally its my belief that despite the good funding that CIG are hemorrhaging money. I've got little to base this off except CIG's behaviour this year with regards to sales, sales, and more sales. For some reason, despite the spending, they seem more and more desperate to sell ships. The only thing that stopping me from declaring they must be losing money is they haven't yet started selling apartments or had another land sale.

Let's see what the big con this year brings.

 

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USA! USA! USA!

The country where corporations make the laws!

Also, again, we are in a bit of a grey area regarding profit. We don't know CIG's financials for this year, but as long as money in > money out then they can claim to have made a profit, regardless of not delivering a product to market. Well, unless we count Chris' "playable now narrative"

EDIT: Personally its my belief that despite the good funding that CIG are hemorrhaging money. I've got little to base this off except CIG's behaviour this year with regards to sales, sales, and more sales. For some reason, despite the spending, they seem more and more desperate to sell ships. The only thing that stopping me from declaring they must be losing money is they haven't yet started selling apartments or had another land sale.

Let's see what the big con this year brings.

That is a very rough description of profit. Money in can come from taking a loan and that certainly doesn't qualify as a portion in the profit statement. Revenue > Expenditures would be better, although accountants may still crucify you for that.