Ownership
Newcastle United was set up as a private company limited by shares on 6 September 1895. The club traded in this way for much of the 20th century, until April 1997, when John Hall, who bought 72.9% of the club for £3 million in 1991, floated the club on the stock exchange as a public limited company, with less than half the shares sold to the Hall family and the majority holding going to his business partner Freddy Shepherd. Later that year Hall stepped down as chairman and was replaced by Shepherd, with the Hall family represented on the board by John's son Douglas. In December 1998, after buying a 6.3% stake in the club for £10m, the media group NTL had considered a full takeover of the club. This was later dropped after the April 1999 Competition Commission, brought in due to government concerns about football clubs being owned by media companies.
In 2007, businessman Mike Ashley purchased the combined stakes of both Douglas and John Hall, 41% share in the club, through a holding company St James Holdings, with a view to buy the rest. Upon purchasing this share he appointed Chris Mort as chairman, while gaining more shares, owning 93.19% of the club by 29 June 2007. This figure reached 95% on 11 July 2007, forcing the remaining shareholders to sell their shares.
Since completing the purchase of the club, Ashley has twice announced that he planned to sell the club. The first occurred after fan protests over the resignation of Kevin Keegan on 14 September 2008, when Ashley stated "I have listened to you. You want me out. That is what I am now trying to do". However, he took it off the market on 28 December 2008 after being unable to find a buyer. On 31 May 2009 it was reported that Ashley was attempting to sell the club again. On 8 June 2009, Ashley confirmed that the club was up for sale at an asking price of £100 million. By the end of August 2009, the club was back off the market.
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