At Camp Nou, there is seldom ever a dull moment. A crisis is emerging that could endanger Joan Laporta’s position as club president just as things seemed to be turning around for Barcelona.
Cadena Cope claims that Barcelona inflated their accounts erroneously with their own funds. La Liga’s estimate of Barcelona’s income is €150m different from their own, which contributes to their inability to sign players.
This, according to previous reports, was caused by La Liga refusing to recognize the capital gains on its economic levers. According to Cope, this is in fact a component of the sale of Sixth Street’s 25% of Cope’s TV rights. In contrast to Barcelona’s expected revenue of €667 million, the US corporation reported an outlay of €517 million.
According to reports, Logskley Investments S.L., a firm formed by Sixth Street and Barcelona with each possessing a 50% stake, allegedly contributed the difference. In order to artificially inflate the value of the TV rights contract, they later lent Logskley Investments €150 million of their own money, which was then repaid to Barcelona as part of the arrangement.
Although it is unclear at this time whether this has any legal ramifications, it does mean that Barcelona will owe tax on the transaction in the amount of almost €37 million.
Barcelona is still unable to register players as a result, and their financial trick has cost them a lot of money. Barcelona supporters will also be suspicious of Laporta’s reliability as he once again damaged the club’s brand while adopting dubious methods to boost their finances.