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Which club is worth more? City or Real?

Real Madrid president Florentino Pérez is in election mode. He says the Spanish football giants are worth €10bn and rising. “In a few years it will be worth €20bn,” he told the Financial Times this week. He’s not the only one who thinks his club’s value has hit 11 figures. Manchester City chair Khaldoon Al Mubarak, who also leads Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala, says the club has multiplied in value since Sheikh Mansour first bought in at an estimated valuation of $100mn-$120mn in 2008. “If you’re going to sell all this today in the market, you wouldn’t sell it for less than $10 billion minimum,” Khaldoon said in his annual interview published by City. He went on to say the club wasn’t for sale, just to be clear. So far only the Los Angeles Lakers have hit the $10bn mark, although the Seattle Seahawks might soon join them. Minority deals are getting done in that ball park too. But can a football team really be worth that much? Real Madrid have been crowned champion...
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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’...

Bristol City benefit from new financial rules

Football finance guru Kieran Maguire reckons that Bristol City will be one of the beneficiaries of the new EFL finance rules.  However, he admits that the real winners are the clubs that receive substantial parachute payments to the detriment of clubs like the Robins:  https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/bristol-city-backed-among-winners-10998947 The football regulator is looking at parachute payments, but no early decision is expected.

Clubs warned over crypto sponsorship

The chief UK financial regulator has warned Premier League football clubs they could face legal action over “questionable sponsorship deals” with crypto companies that are not authorised to operate in Britain. The Financial Conduct Authority has written a letter to Premier League men’s clubs stating they risk enforcement action by taking sponsorship money from crypto and trading companies that are not permitted to offer services in the UK. Crypto companies have become prolific sponsors of top-tier teams in recent years as they seek to tap into the millions of football supporters and encourage them to trade digital tokens.  The FCA said it had seen “an increase in football club partnerships with unauthorised firms, some of which appear to be operating unlawfully”. In the letter, Fiona Mackinnon-Miller, head of the FCA department overseeing scams, promotions and consumer investments, warned that such deals “risk conferring legitimacy on these firms and may expose UK consumers to ...

The sad plight of Saints

My large family displays no interest in football, the one exception being a son-in-law who is a Southampton season ticket holder.   I have not intruded into private grief but his wife tells me he will not discuss Spygate. The following material extracts highlights from the Swiss Ramble’s latest review of the club.   Much more in depth analysis is available on his Substack page. Southampton had long been held up as an example of a club punching above its weight, finishing in the top eight four seasons in a row during their 11-year stay in the top flight, but went down in 2022/23, finishing in 20th place. The relegation in 2022/23 took place in the first full season under the control of Serbian media mogul Dragan Solak, who bought 80% of the club for £100m in January 2022 via his investment vehicle Sport Republic Limited.   However, the rot had already started to set in after Chinese businessman Gao Jisheng acquired a majority stake in 2017, with Katharina Liebhe...

Premier League clubs hoover up Champions League cash

Alongside the finalists, the New York Times estimates four other clubs broached €100m (£86.6m) in prize money this season: Bayern Munich, Liverpool, Atletico Madrid and Real Madrid. Prior to 2024-25 there were only 25 instances of clubs topping €100m in UEFA earnings; using our figures, 13 clubs in the past two seasons have done so. Only two English clubs landed in that category this season but Premier League sides, unsurprisingly given there were six of them, hoovered up the most money of any one country. We estimated those six — Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester City, Newcastle United and Tottenham Hotspur — have earned a combined €591.5m (£514.8m) from this season’s competition. The next highest national cohort, five teams from Spain, have received over €200m less.

International investors have taken over South Shields

National League North side South Shields have been taken over by a group of international investors led by Jason Ye:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9we09dzxpzo A graduate of New York University, Ye obtained his law degree at Rutgers.  His links with South Shields are obscure. Jason was selected to the 2020 New York Metro Corporate and Securities Law “Super Lawyer” Rising Stars list. Jason currently sits on the Alumni Steering Committee of the Rutgers Center for Corporate Law and Governance. An expert on China-related capital market matters, Jason has been invited to many speaking engagements globally and quoted on numerous occasions by major media outlets in the U.S. and China.