The Agnelli family ruled out Tether’s proposal and reaffirmed that the club is not for sale.
The owners of the Juventus publicly rejected a purchase offer presented by a cryptocurrency company on Saturday, thus ensuring that the most successful club in the history of the Serie A will continue under the control of the Agnelli family.
The crypto firm Tether presented an offer close to 1 billion euros (around 1.2 billion dollars) for the Agnelli family’s majority stake in the Italian club, 36-time league champion.
“Juventus, our history and our values are not for sale,” said John Elkann, CEO of Exor, the Agnelli family holding company, in a video message posted on the club’s website.
“Juve has been part of my family for 102 years,” Elkann added. “Over a century, four generations have encouraged her, strengthened her, cared for her in difficult times and celebrated her in many moments of joy.”
“We continue to support our team and look to the future to build a winning Juventus,” added Elkann, grandson of Fiat magnate Giovanni “Gianni” Agnelli.
Juventus has not won Serie A since winning nine consecutive titles between 2012 and 2020. The Turin club fired Igor Tudor and hired Luciano Spalletti last month after a difficult start to the season.
Spalletti expressed his support for the owners’ position.
“It is a pleasure to once again feel the strength and passion of John Elkann and his family for this club,” he said at a press conference prior to the Serie A match against Bologna Sunday. “It is clear that it is up to us to give substance in exchange for that passion, to honor the past and build a future on the same level, or even better, as John Elkann himself told us when he came to visit us.”
Former Juventus president Andrea Agnelli and the club’s entire board of directors resigned in 2022 amid an investigation into accounting fraud.
Several of Italy’s big clubs — AC Milan, Inter and Roma — are owned by foreign investment funds. Juventus and the current champion of Serie A, Napoli, which belongs to the Italian film producer Aurelio De Laurentiis, are the main bastions that remain in national hands.
“Exor reaffirms its previous and consistent statements that it has no intention of selling any of its Juventus shares to a third party, including — but not limited to — Tether, based in El Salvador“Exor said in a statement.
“Juventus is a historic and successful club, of which Exor and the Agnelli family have been stable and proud shareholders for more than a century, and remain fully committed to the institution, supporting its new management team in the execution of a clear strategy to achieve solid results both on and off the field.”
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
