Barcelona activate fourth lever, raising €100m
Robin Bairner
- Updated: 12 Aug 2022 12:21 BST
- 3 min read
Barcelona have confirmed that they have sold 24.5% of Barca Studios to Orpheus Media to raise €100 million.
The Catalan club had been hit by a delay in the sale, which was expected to go through on Thursday.
Now the club face a race against time to register their seven summer signings with La Liga, including Robert Lewandowski, Raphinha and Jules Kounde, in a bid to have them available for Saturday's match against Rayo Vallecano - a process that generally takes two days.
This is the fourth lever activated by Barcelona in a bid to keep themselves competitive during a period of financial crisis. These have involved selling off long-term assets in a bid to give the club short-term income to keep them at the top of the game.
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A statement on the club's website reads: "FC Barcelona announces the sale of 24.5% of Barca Studios to the company Orpheus Media, managed by Mr Jaume Roures, an audiovisual production company with a long history of producing content, for €100 million.
"The agreement complements the one signed on 29 July with Socios.com and will help to accelerate the growth of the club's digital, NFT and Web.3 strategy.
"The sale was conducted under authorisation of the General Assembly of FC Barcelona Members last October 23.
"With this investment, the strategic partners in Barca Studios show confidence in the value of the project and the future of digital content in the world of sport."
What are Barcelona's financial levers?
The first two financial levers activated by Barcelona this summer mean that they have sold 25% of their La Liga television rights to American investment firm Sixth Street, which raised a total of €400m.
When it became apparent that this was not enough to satisfy the hunger of the club for new signings, they activated a third lever, which was to sell 25% of Barca Studios to Socios.com.
The fourth lever means that they have now sold off another 24.5% of Barca Studios to Orpheus Media.
Can Barcelona register their new signings now?
It is expected that this €100m injection of cash should allow Barcelona to register their players with La Liga, although Juanme Roures, owner of Orpheus Media admitted that he did not know if this will be sufficient.
"I don’t know what Barca will need to register all the players," he admitted. "What I do know is that this investment of €100m gives us to see the team we want to see tomorrow."
Despite this huge injection of cash over the summer, Barcelona are still eager to add Marcos Alonso of Chelsea and Manchester City midfielder Bernardo Silva to their squad before the transfer deadline.
