Arsenal have announced an overall loss of £17.7 million for the year ending 31 May 2024, a year-on-year improvement of £34.4 million.
Despite significant growth in key revenue streams – matchday, broadcast, and commercial – leading to a record level of revenue (£616.6 million in 2024 vs £466.7 million in 2023), a £93 million increase in the wage bill meant the club still recorded a loss.
Arsenal also confirmed continued compliance with UEFA and Premier League FFP regulations.
To read the full statement, click here.
TOPLINE FIGURES
| 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | |
| Matchday revenue | 98.90 | 96.20 | 78.80 | 3.80 | 79.40 | 102.60 | 131.70 |
| Broadcast revenue | 180.00 | 183.00 | 118.90 | 184.40 | 146.00 | 191.20 | 262.30 |
| Commercial revenue | 106.90 | 110.80 | 142.30 | 136.40 | 141.70 | 169.30 | 218.30 |
| Player sales | 120.00 | 12.12 | 60.10 | 11.80 | 22.20 | 10.70 | 51.10 |
| Player loans | 2.30 | 4.60 | 3.50 | 3.10 | 2.00 | 1.50 | 1.40 |
| Wages | 209.10 | 205.20 | 234.50 | 244.40 | 212.30 | 234.80 | 327.80 |
| Net finance charges | 8.70 | 12.00 | 13.60 | 39.80 | 5.20 | 6.20 | 18.40 |
Matchday revenue
Despite early exits from the Carabao Cup and FA Cup for Mikel Arteta’s side, the men’s run to the quarter-finals of the Champions League meant there were 25 matches at the Emirates (compared to 24 in 2023) as well as a pre-season friendly. Higher ticket prices and a negligible increase in the average attendance (60,095 vs 60,082) also contributed to the big jump in matchday revenue, far exceeding last year’s income.
Broadcast revenue
A huge increase of £70 million is basically down to that sweet, sweet Champions League cash which we’d be craving for so long. Arsenal’s run to the quarter-finals secured them £80.4 million compared to £22 million from the Europa League the year before.
Commercial revenue
Commercial performance saw strong growth, led by the renewal and extension of our Emirates partnership, complemented by the Sobha Realty Training Centre naming rights deal and a higher number of secondary agreements at improved valuations. The club also namechecked a successful tour of the USA.
Player sales
The sales of summer 2023 – Folarin Balogun, Pablo Mari, Granit Xhaka, Rob Holding and Auston Trusty – all contributed to a much-improved balance sheet. The financial benefits of selling last summer’s cohort (Nketiah, Smith Rowe, Ramsdale, Biereth) won’t be felt until next year.
Player loans
Arsenal did around 30 loan deals in the summer of 2023 and January 2024 but most brought in negligible fees as they involved moving youngsters. In fact, the fee received for loans is the lowest since we started keeping a closer record of things.
Wages
Ben White, Takehiro Tomiyasu, William Saliba, Martin Odegaard, Reiss Nelson, Bukayo Saka and Aaron Ramsdale all penned new deals during the last financial year, which, added to the wages of new boys Kai Havertz, Jurrien Timber and Declan Rice, has seen our wage bill explode by £93 million per year. By a long shot, it’s the most it’s ever been and heaps the pressure on the squad to keep qualifying for the Champions League. At the same time, the wage-to-revenue ratio at £53 in every £100 remains relatively favourable and well below Uefa’s financial sustainability rules.
Net finance charge
The increase reflects a combination of higher borrowings and higher market interest rates.
Pretty healthy looking.
Especially compared to Manch-austere Utd
…Thank David Squires for that one.
My roomate’s mom-in-regulation makes usd eighty one each hour at the laptop . She has been fired for eight months but remaining month her paycheck turned into usd 17367 just operating
on the pc for a few hours….. Money63.solar
Blogs can someone ban this spamming c*nt please
Bottom line never tells the whole story. Quick glance. Club generated 30% more cash (note 21) and highest paid director received a 46% pay rise. Material debt owed to ultimate holding company – perhaps they could write some of it off so club can buy more players 🙂
I used to pay £1.50 on the gate to stand on the north bank as a junior gunner.
These figures blow my fucking mind.
not too far off. the match day revenue in that table is 3.80 🙂
Me too, and never once had to buy a ticket in advance. Brilliant days
Taking a leak down a rolled up newspaper wasn’t much fun though…..especially for the guys down the front.
Well that is something I have never done.
If you had seen the state of the latrines you would have done.
Win a trophy and that will improve yet further. Definitely heading in the right direction.
Presumably we have to show a loss so we don’t waste resources on tax?
This wage bill doesn’t seem to add up. With a squad as small as ours, how are we paying over 100m more a year in wages then Man Citeh?
Every Premier League Club Ranked by Their Wage Bill
I would say it’s because that article is completely wrong
Just to second this. That article ‘estimates’ Arsenal’s wage bill for this season to be £172.1 million. Seems pretty dumb given Arsenal’s declared wage bill for last year, as per their financial results, was £234.8 million.
Apart from City’s (“alleged”) non-transparency re financials, I’d guess this explains part of it — “The financial benefits of selling last summer’s cohort (Nketiah, Smith Rowe, Ramsdale, Biereth) won’t be felt until next year.”
20m for Eddie looks like the deal of the century for us
It’s in line with the 20-25m each that Liverpool got for Solanke and Ings. Edu was always going to get good value for those players. It would just involve changing Arsenal’s soft touch market reputation. He ran down the clock daring mid-table clubs desperate for talent to blink first. They did.
https://swissramble.substack.com/p/a-spending-cap-in-the-premier-league
Might be a more accurate read.
Not that the fact we keep losing dozens of millions year after year stop the loud choruses of fans blaming our owners for not spending? I’ll always love that our club is one of a handful of the top clubs in the world that is self financed and doesn’t rely on external funds from oligarchs or nation states to achieve everything that it has.
And if you argue that 2nd place isn’t an achievement, I’ll argue that it absolutely is when 1st place is a cheater with unlimited funds.
It does not. Firstly, PSR allows clubs to run losses upto specified limits over a three year cycle. We are not near that limit. Secondly, year on year profit/loss is not the only metric that speaks to a club’s financial health. If the Kroeneks were to sell the club today, they would make a healthy profit on their original investment – mostly as a reward for their ability to turn underperformance into revenue. I would prefer to see more of the club’s value reflected on the pitch. I agree with you that City are cheating. I hope they are punished… Read more »
Almost all fair points. I guess I find it hard to determine just how much value increase there has been per year that they should be expected to spend into the loss column. And the one point you made that I think might be wrong is that we’re not near the PSR limit, because James’ reporting on Arsecast seemed to be saying otherwise, that if we had mad a large spend this last window we would’ve been very limited this coming summer.
PSR allows for a £105m loss over three years. Certain expenses – like the academy – are not counted toward the loss. Reliable people like Swiss Ramble (subscription or summarized here) find that we’re at least £100-120m away from that limit. Those analyses were written *before* the sales of Nketiah, Smith Rowe and Ramsdale. James is unlikely to have different numbers. He is likely reporting, based on sources within, that the club is concerned about PSR. My concern is that the club – not James – is being dishonest, by framing a desire to control spending as a compliance issue.… Read more »
The reality is that people within the club know more than anyone, including even Swiss Ramble as fantastic as he is, is going to be able to take from analysing publicly available financial records and putting models on top of it. Those sources are likely to be aware of a numerous amount of factors which might very quickly erode that £100-120m gap identified. You’ve got basic and easily identifiable factors like unexpected underperformance, through to much more subjective things like the potential for costs we’ve historically allocated as allowable to be challenged or the potential for the auditor to identify… Read more »
we might very well have a couple of cases like that, though with slightly lesser wages and many less years on their contract, in Jesus and Tomiyasu. As much as I love both players and want to be hopeful, I don’t know if their health situations will allow them to play for Arsenal again given we at some point soon have to make room in the squad for players who will be more reliably available.
Can someone breakdown the wages? The vast majority must be for the 1st team squad, let’s say 80%, which is around 260 million. 24 players, so around 10 million each per year. Is the mean Arsenal first team salary really around 200k p/w these days?
Plausible I suppose but still seems crazy when you type it out.
Yeah, a breakdown of who earns what would be useful…
The club doctors must make a fair few bob with all their overtime. And Jover will be on £1m a week.
Jover sign da ting!!
When wages are that high, are employer NI and pension contributions etc equivalently high or do those rules just stop applying at some point?
Does anybody know the impact of the women’s team on he financial reports?
Does anybody know the impact of the women’s team on the financial reports?
I’d be more concerned about the impact of the financial reports on the women’s team.
To add an elite striker with a big fee and big wages we would need to counter balance it with a player or two leaving, the departures this summer is likely Partey, Jorginho, Tierney on a free, we could get something around £40 mil for Zichenko and Kiwior if we’re lucky, obviously this will reflect on the wage bill but lewis and Ethan will deserve an upgrade on their contracts, it still leaves us a few players short, Zichenko wages is £150,000 a week. We will paying an injured Jesus a lot more who had about 3 decent games after… Read more »
How do you know Zinchenko is on 150k/wk? We’ll be lucky if we can get 20mil for him. Agree Jesus is done, we should try and move him on aggressively or pay off the remainder of his contract, which I think is thru 2027. Damn, he’s turned out to be a major bust. Injuries have really fkd him, and us!
https://www.spotrac.com/epl/arsenal-fc/cap/_/year/2024
I assume this if fairly close
Some of those figures are daylight robbery.
They’re all also complete guesswork
Are you sure about that? Ornstein confirms Havertz is biggest earner at the club…
https://www.reddit.com/r/Gunners/comments/1aeplj1/david_ornstein_confirms_kai_havertz_is_earning_a/
I think he might be – but those wage lists are anything other than guesswork. No club releases that info publicly, so they guess.
Wow…if accurate that’s crazy. We knew Havertz was earning the most but can’t believe it’s that much we pay him. Insane. Ditto Jesus. Clear those two off the wages bill and we would have a lot of capacity to completely retool the front line to what we need.
Fair play to those extra 13 fans going to the home games. Now, how about we do the right thing and end the Rwanda deal?
I had totally forgotten Ramsdale’s contract extension. Bet the auditors had a sly chuckle there.
Eeeerm……Does this mean we can buy Zubamendi, Sesko and Williams in the summer?
It’s hard to tell for certain from these filings, but Arsenal seems to be in a strong position next summer with respect to FFP. The Sporting Director vacancy was probably one factor in Arsenal’s decision to forgo the striker signing at an extortionate price. Having a larger war chest will make the SD position even more attractive to prospective candidates.