Skip to main content

Ajax have a sustainable business model

The authoritative Swiss Ramble has reported on Ajax's  2019/20 accounts.

Profit before tax fell €42m from €69m to €27m (profit after tax down from €52m €20m), largely due to revenue dropping €37m (16%) from a record €199m to €162m and expenses increasing by €17m to €220m, partly offset by profit on player sales rising €12m to €84m.

The club are known for their strategy of developing and selling players. They have earnt €400m from this activity in the last 10 years, averaging €69m a season since 2017.

Despite the fall, the club's €27m profit is still the highest in the Eredivisie, well ahead of the next highest, AZ €8m. As a rule, very few Dutch clubs make big money, so Ajax €69m surplus in 2018/19 was something special and unlikely to be repeated.

Ajax have a sustainable business model, reporting profits in nine of the last 10 years (only loss was €1m in 2015/16). In that period, they have accumulated over a quarter of a billion Euros profit, averaging €26m a season. However, they do expect a loss in 2020/21 due to Covid.

The €42m revenue fall was largely due to less progress in the Champions League and pandemic impact. As a result, broadcasting dropped €33m (37%) from €89m to €56m, while match day was down €9m (18%) from €51m to €42m. Commercial increased €5m (8%) from €60m to €65m.

There is an enormous revenue disparity for Dutch clubs, the Eredivisie had €594m revenue in 2018/19, just 10% of the Premier League €5.9 bn. Also miles behind Spain €3.4 bn, Germany €3.3 bn, Italy €2.5 bnn & France €1.9 bn. Also below Russia €752m and Turkey €748m.

The Swiss Ramble estimates that Ajax earned €48m from Europe in 2019/20: €47m from the Champions League group stage plus another €1m after dropping down to the Europa League. Much lower than €79m earned the previous season, when they reached the Champions League semi-final.

Ajax have earned a chunky €152m from European competition in the last five years, which is even more impressive considering they did not reach the group stage of Champions League or Europa League in 2017/18. Next highest for Dutch clubs: PSV €94m and Feyenoord €30m. The importance of Champions League qualification for Ajax cannot be overstated. Including €10m gate receipts, they earned €56m, which was around a third of their total revenue.

Average attendance of 52,300 remains the highest in the Eredivisie, around 11,000 more than Feyenoord 42,200. The only other Dutch clubs above 20,000 were PSV Eindhoven with 33,600 and Twente Enschede 27,200.

The club's €65m commercial revenue is the highest in the Eredivisie, well ahead of Feyenoord €45m and PSV €40m. However, it is less than a fifth of the elite European clubs, such as Barcelona €384m, PSG €363m and Bayern Munich €357m. No wonder Ajax aspire to be the Bayern Munich of their league.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's no deal say Spurs insiders over Taiwanese takeover

Senior figures at Tottenham Hotspur insisted on Friday that they had not been informed of any deal to sell Daniel Levy’s stake in the club. A business group, Eight Sports Capital — which is said to include a billionaire Taiwanese financier — claimed that it had an agreement in place to buy a 24.99 per cent stake in ENIC, the club’s majority owners, from Levy, who owns 29.88 per cent. The Times has been told Ng Wing Fai and Brooklyn Earick form part of the group, having both been linked previously to potential takeovers of the Premier League club. The Taiwanese businessman, Richard Tsai, is also said to be part of the consortium. He is reportedly worth £7 billion.  Last year Earick, the former DJ and tech entrepreneur, was part of an attempted £4.5 billion takeover, which was “unequivocally rejected” by Spurs.  An ENIC spokesperson said: “We can confirm that neither ENIC nor THFC are aware of any sale by Daniel Levy’s Family Trust of its minority stake in ENIC, THFC’...
Post a Comment
Read more

Spurs CEO attacks luxury training base

The Tottenham Hotspur chief executive Vinai Venkatesham has issued a withering assessment of the way the club was run under Daniel Levy, likening the state-of-the-art training centre to a five-star hotel rather than a centre of high performance.  Venkatesham was appointed to his role in April 2025, having stepped down as chief executive at Arsenal the previous summer. However, he has said that some aspects of the club were “in a significantly worse state” than he expected.  “Our training centre is amazing, one of the best, if not the best in the world,” Venkatesham told BBC Sport. “But when you look around, it looks more like a five-star hotel than it does a performance environment. That will change over the summer. I think there are many areas where the club hasn’t got the right level of expertise.”  He explained that the football side of operations was the club’s main downfall when he arrived last year. [One Spurs fan wryly observed that it was like a water company sayi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Fulham requires big funding from owner

After lengthy delays, Fulham’s shiny, new Riverside Stand has finally opened, creating “a unique Thameside destination with first class facilities for supporters and partners on match days, as well as for the wider community year-round”. This ambitious project has increased Craven Cottage’s capacity by around 4,000 to 29,600, while it has also taken advantage of the club’s fantastic location and wealthy catchment area by including two Michelin star restaurants, a rooftop swimming pool, corporate hospitality and event space, all benefiting from views of the Thames. Chief executive Alistair Mackintosh observed, “Fulham is the sort of club that can have a business class or first class and have fans that turn left on a plane.” Indeed, there is also an exclusive members club – with a football season ticket as an optional extra. It’s fair to say that “the times they are a-changing”, as this is a long way from the traditional pie and a pint. However, in a world where clubs face the tw...
Post a Comment
Read more