2023/24 Premier League Financial Results

Where history was made on and off the pitch

Another record breaking year for the Premier League that saw Manchester City win its 4th premier league title in a row also saw record breaking numbers across nearly every metric

First; Looking Back

*2020 to 2024

The Premier League over the last 5 years has continued to grow in revenue and spending

Last season the Premier League broke the £6bn barrier with this year now exceeding £6.3bn

Additionally profit on player sales exceeded £1bn for the first time as pressure from PSR is applied to a lot of clubs which forces teams to sell players to get direct profit on their accounts

The other big ear marker is that Premier League clubs have lost a combined £3bn+ over the last 5 years a huge difference than the previous 5 seasons which saw clubs make a combined £916m as shown below

*2015 to 2019

Profit and Losses

However 2023/24 has shown a much better trend down in overall total losses to only £167m for the premier league compared to the previous 4 seasons continuing a trend of returning to profitability with 7 clubs showing profit. The key big team losses being Manchester United at £131m and Aston Villa with £86m

Should note 1 of the 7 profitable clubs being Chelsea who reported a massive £128m profit after selling their Women’s team (to themselves) for £200m with that addition the trend is still going well.

Revenue

On the revenue side the traditional big 6 continue to dominate revenue with those 6 clubs having a total of £3.6bn which is over 60% of the PLs total revenue

However recent gate crashers Newcastle have started to close the gap on Chelsea’s revenue only being £160m behind which could see a big 7 start taking place if a trend continues.

Matchday Revenue

Matchday revenue made up only £908m of the total revenue. Only accounting for an average of 14% of clubs revenue

The big 6 still dominate this area with them owning £600m of it. Manchester United had a 25% increase to £163m While spurs had a 20% increase to £117m

Broadcast Revenue

Broadcast revenue is the main revenue earner for all clubs and the most balanced revenue across the PL teams accounting for more than 50% of all revenue. Clubs out of the big 6 generally have between 60-80% of their revenue coming from broadcast with Bournemouth at a 87% high.

Commercial Revenue

Commercial is completely dominated by the big 6 due to their recent and historical success which gives them a significant advantage over the rest of the premier league.

Out of the £2.1bn they account for £1.65bn commercial revenue with all 6 clubs having 35%+ of their revenue derived from commercial revenue. All big 6 clubs hit historical highs in commercial revenue with only Manchester United maintaining the same revenue as the previous season.

To put it in perspective Manchester City makes more commercial revenue than the bottom 12 PL clubs combined.

Wages

Wages in the premier league have also hit a historical high in the premier league at £4bn. Wages in the premier league have a high correlation between their rank and the clubs finishing spot (although not perfect)

Most teams finish 1-4 places between their wage rank and their finishing position with the only real overperformer being Crystal palace from 16th wage rank to 10th table position while there was 2 huge under performers in United from 2nd to 8th and Nottingham Forest from 9th Wage rank to 17th table position (which is kind of telling to how they’re going this season in 24/25)

Amortization

Amortization is the combined asset cost via transfers that the club books on their accounts (i.e Transfer fee+Agent fee divided by contracted years). Naturally Chelsea who have spent an absurd amount on recent purchases have increased their amortization to the highest in the premier league for the first time. Premier League clubs have a total of £1.7bn allocated to Amortization

Profit from Player Sales

Profit from player sales is the transfer fee received by a club minus the remaining amortization which is a direct profit hit to a clubs accounts (very different from traditional Transfer Sales, Purchases or Netspend)

Squad Cost and Sustainability

Squad cost is the combination of Wages + Amortization to get a better view of how much a club spends on its squad for the season which helps understand how sustainable clubs also are

Squad cost control est = (80% of Wages + Amortisation + Impairment) /

 (Total Revenue + Profit from player Sales + Other non operating income stream)

To understand the new squad control coming in its good to put wages at around 80% as squad control only counts player wages rather than total wages (clubs do not release their split wage cost)

From this you can see most clubs will be okay as they adjust their costs to be sustainable. Bournemouth, Villa, Fulham, Everton and Palace will probably need to do some work to adjust

Accounts Net spend

Transfers on accounts

Chelsea had the highest netspend at £345m by far eclipsing everyone which is more than the bottom 13 clubs on this chart with a staggering £553m spent on players in 1 financial season

Transfers on accounts 2020 to 2024

However even with that huge outlay in 1 season over the last 5 financial years they still sit 3rd with both United and Arsenal eclipsing them which is mainly due to Arsenal and Uniteds poor transfer selling while Chelsea are fantastic sellers selling near £800m over those years

Net spend as reported by Media/Journalists 2020 to 2024

Its also interesting to compare the last 5 years in netspend in accounts vs media reported transfer fees. Something media transfer fees do not include is how much of certain bonuses have been hit or how much agent fees were paid as part of the transfer fee. From my other threads I do on netspend you can clearly see the difference between booked accounts vs media reported transfer fees between 2020 and 2024 Chelsea had the highest netspend in the media however in reality its Arsenal who had the highest on their accounts during the actual financial periods of 2020 to 2024

(Caveat important to note that a transfer done between 1st of June to 30th of June will count towards the previous year accounts but would be on the next year for media net spend)

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