BarcelonaA decisive turn in the concession of Barça’s fourth lever, essential for the club to register the seven tickets pending registration in the League. Everything was conspired so that the investment fund GDA Luma would keep 24.5% of Barça Studios in exchange for 100 million euros. But the legal and bureaucratic problems, with changes in conditions in the middle, to finish the sale have frustrated the operation, which will finally be closed with Orpheus Media, a company owned by the Catalan businessman Jaume Roures (Mediapro).
“This agreement complements the one already signed last July 29 with Socios.com and will serve to accelerate the growth of the club’s digital, NFT and Web.3 strategy,” Barça announced through its official channels . In other words, the metaverse, as the ARA already advanced two weeks ago, appears to help the entity add value to Barça Studios, which until now was a loss-making business, and to register players in time for the start of the official season. The injection is 200 million euros, four times more than what was said to be received in exchange for half of the production company at last October’s meeting. However, it is worth saying that the board and the then CEO Ferran Reverter, when asking for the consent of the trustees, did not talk about NFT or blockchain. In fact, within the club itself there are voices at the moment that pray that no member critical of the current management contests the lever for not adhering to what the assembly approved.
In any case, through a new purely Laportian twist, Barça has managed to close an agreement with a trusted businessman and has sent all the paperwork to Madrid so that the League can review and validate it before the first official match, which is this Saturday at Camp Nou against Rayo Vallecano (9 p.m.). But that fourth lever is only a vital part because there are seven players yet to sign up (Sergi Roberto, Dembélé, Lewandowski, Raphinha, Kounde, Kessie and Christensen). The other step necessary to proceed with the full registration goes through two possibilities. One is the reinterpretation by the League of the first two levers, those of 25% of the television rights, which Barça recognizes with a capital gain of 150 million against the employer’s criteria. And the other, parallel to the first, is the acceleration of an agreement for the salary reduction or deferral of Gerard Piqué or Sergio Busquets. The epic is served.
With the center, which is set to receive 52 million gross euros this year between salary and deferrals, the pact would be much lower and with a waiver of money, while the midfield is studying with its advisers a proposal to defer amounts from a renewal for one or two years with an escape clause at the end of each fiscal year to leave for the United States. Of the two routes, the more advanced is that of Piqué, who will lose prominence in Xavi Hernández’s plans after the arrival of Kounde and Christensen. With Busquets it is “very complicated”, they say from those around him, that an agreement can be reached in the short term. Therefore, once again the Catalan defender focuses his attention on helping the club sign up players. Last year his salary gesture served the record of Memphis and Eric Garcia. This year he has at hand another reason to win the crowd’s ovation.
The precedent of the guarantee
It is not the first time that Jaume Roures rescues Barça and Laporta on the horn with Orpheus Media. In fact, the inauguration of the current president required the economic boost of this society to prevent a repeat of the electoral scenario at the Barcelona club. It was 30 million that Roures counter-guaranteed so that the directive reached the figure that conformed to the regulations. The rest of the pie was largely assumed by José Elías through Audax Renovables, his energy company. This move led to the entry into the government of Eduard Romeu as economic vice-president. He took over from Jaume Giró, who fell from Laporta’s board before the takeover due to deep disagreements.
