What? Is that allowed?
It is perfectly normal for corporate companies to pay dividends, but United are the only football club that does this. The club cites that this does not affect the investment in the club (more than 1 billion pounds over 10 years) and that the percentage is small compared to revenue. What’s more, while nearly all of the money goes to the Glazers, some of the dividends are also paid out to small investors, foundations and fan associations. Despite not the best results in recent seasons, the club’s income from 2012 to 2019 grew – and set a record (627.1 million pounds). In the next two years, the amount sank to 494.1 million pounds, but it is still a successful project from a business point of view. In the last two years, he was hit hard by the covid – and this can be attributed to the drawdown in income. “Sporting success does not really have a significant impact on what we can do in the commercial part of the business,” Ed Woodward said in 2018, confirming these words. True, over the past nine years, Manchester United have finished only four times in the top 4 and got into the Champions League, but even there they did not get beyond the quarter-finals, and this deprives the club of a significant amount of payments from UEFA. There is another problem: rivals are successful in the transfer market when selling players, but United often release players as free agents, although many were bought for a lot of money – like the same Pogba. While rivals Man City and Liverpool are showing growth, Manchester United have found themselves on a plateau. Because sports performance does have an impact on income, says Kieran Maguire, a professor at the University of Liverpool and football economist. “Sponsors will only pay more if the club delivers results. If you look at commercial income, it went from £152m in 2013 to £268m in 2016. It’s just amazing. But it actually happened thanks to deals with Chevrolet and adidas. So they had to either make new deals or get more from existing sponsors. I think this is where it was difficult because if you are a commercial partner you want your product to be close to success and Manchester United is not successful.So since 2016 we’ve been seeing a plateau in commercial earnings and it’s getting harder and harder because United are relying on their history to get deals, not the present.” Maguire is skeptical about the Glazers’ investment. “Perhaps it looks worse for a business that has not been able to invest in property assets,” he explains whether it is bad that the club pays dividends. – If you look at the Big Picture project, at the Super League … According to the plan, central funds were supposed to appear, from which finance capital expenditure projects. United hoped the Premier League would contribute to the development of Old Trafford, not the Glazers.