Spanish football giants, FC Barcelona have confirmed the sale of 24.5% of the Barca studios to the Socios.com company in a deal reportedly worth €100 million.
Barcelona announced this via the club website stating: “FC Barcelona announces the sale of 24.5% of Barça Studios to the company Socios.com for 100 million euros to accelerate the club’s audiovisual, blockchain, NFT and Web.3 strategy.
“The sale has been made in accordance with the authorisation of the General Assembly of FC Barcelona Members held last October 23.”
The deal was also announced by FC Barcelona President, Joan Laporta during a press conference held to present their newest addition, Jules Kounde who arrived from Sevilla in a deal reportedly worth £50 million.
“We are doing everything they are asking in order to register them. I am assuming that they will not put any obstacles in our way. I hope that La Liga make the same interpretation as we do. If not, we will find a solution,” he said.
“We have sold 25% of the television rights for Barcelona. And the sale of €100m for 25% of Barca Studios to Socios.com. We are doing our homework in order to register the players,” he added.
In their continued quest for financial freedom, the sale of 24.5% of the Barca Studios for €100 million is the activation of the economic third lever. Last month, the Catalans club activated the first lever when they sold 10% of their Laliga TV rights to Sixth Street in a deal worth €267million.
A few weeks after the activation of the first lever, the second lever was activated by selling the remaining 15% of the TV rights to Sixth Street who also bought the rights the first time for a deal worth €400million.
Club members of FC Barcelona approved that the club can sell as much as 49% of the club. The sale of 24.5% of the Barca Studios takes the total to 49.5% which has been sold from the club with a total of over €750 million raised in the process. The sale of the TV rights sold to Sixth Street is for 25 years while that of the Barca Studios is permanent but can however be bought back as confirmed by Laporta.
What you should know
- Socios.com is a platform that allows clubs to increase their interaction with fans and try to make more money from it, including the use of Fan Tokens, a kind of digital asset based on blockchain and cryptocurrencies.
- The money made from the sales have been invested in the buying of players in order to make the Spanish club more competitive and get them back to their trophy-winning ways.
- The income would also be used in registering the newly acquired players in order to avoid a repeat of what happened to Lionel Messi where he was unable to be registered with Laliga due to their debts and had to leave for free in the process.
- In addition to Kounde, Barcelona has signed high-profile players like Robert Lewandowski from Bayern Munich and Raphinha from Leeds and signed AC Milan midfielder Franck Kessie and Chelsea’s Danish central defender Andreas Christensen on free transfers.
