Benfica is the most profitable club among Europe's champions

Benfica is the most profitable club among champions of the respective European leagues in the 2016/17 season. This is the conclusion of "The European Champions Report 2018", a study carried out and disclosed by KPMG.

According to the data analyzed by the consultant to evaluate the financial and operational performance of football clubs, the reds have registered, during the last season, a profit of 44,5 million euros, a value that outperforms clubs such as Real Madrid, Chelsea, Bayern Munich or Juventus.

"The winner of the Portuguese league – SL Benfica – more than doubled after-tax profit, registering a value of 45 million euros, while in the 2015/16 season recorded an after-tax profit of 20 million euros", pointed out KPMG in the released study.

Millions of euros which are related, "to a large extent" – and according to "The European Champions Report 2018" –, to the players selling such as Victor Lindelöf (Manchester United) and Gonçalo Guedes (Paris Saint-Germain), who have resulted in, respectively, a net profit of 23 and 26 million euros.

"All the European champions included in the report had after-tax profit, reflecting a new paradigm in the football industry, more turned to the financial sustainability", as mentioned in the study which compares the financial performance of the national champions of 12 European leagues: Monaco, Besiktas, Celtic, Chelsea, Basel, Bayern Munich, Spartak Moscow, Viitorul Constanta, Feyenoord , Juventus, Real Madrid and SL Benfica.

The study still highlights the sustainability capacity of the reds, with the bet on players trained at Caixa Futebol Campus. "The clubs which stand out in the youth training and in the players 'trading' will tend to have competitive advantages", in accordance with the example of the revenues obtained from the club’s transfers, just Benfica (Gonçalo Guedes and Victor Lindelöf), Chelsea and Juventus.

Text: Filipa Fernandes Garcia

Pics: Archive / SL Benfica