September 12 – FC Barcelona’s spending cap has been raised by €800 million to €656 million after the sale of club assets, the Spanish topflight La Liga confirmed.
Last season, Barcelona’s spending was capped at €96 million, which was then reduced in January to minus €144 million. That negative cap impaired the club’s transfer dealings but was a result of LaLiga’s financial controls that penalised the Catalan giants for running up debts and future liabilities of €1.35 billion, with €673 million owed to banks.
This season La Liga has lifted the cap to a spending limit of €656 million after Barca embarked on a series of asset sales. In Spain, the cap amounts to the spend of a club on salaries, bonuses and amortisation payments on transfers across a season.
Barcelona sold 25% of their domestic television rights to US investment firm Sixth Street for the next 25 years in two deals worth more than €500 million. The club raised an additional €200 million from the sale of a 49% stake in Barça Studios in two separate transactions, while also signing a long-term sponsorship deal with the streaming giant Spotify in March.
La Liga boss Javier Tebas however warned that the club will have to keep reducing their wage bill.
“Without the [sale of assets] it may not be so high next season,” said Tebas. “They may have to reduce their outgoings by around €200 million by selling players or even [selling more] assets.”
“The same rules are applied to all the clubs in Spain. To register Koundé, the president of Barcelona had to put up a personal guarantee. Is there a risk of bankruptcy? In my opinion, I don’t think so, not at all. They have a high wage bill but a lot of equity, although … they have had and [will] have to reduce the wage bill.”
The sale of assets allowed Barcelona to sign Robert Lewandowski, Raphinha and Jules Koundé.
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