Italian football revenues are growing, but issues remain, such as debt and aging stadiums.
Over the past two seasons, Italian football, despite a persistently large number of critical areas (from facilities to debt), has seen overall revenues increase, surpassing the historic €4.5 billion mark in the 2023/24 season. However, revenues grew at a much faster rate than costs. Specifically, between 2021-22 and 2023-24, revenues grew by 32%, compared to a 7% increase in labor costs, whose impact on production value therefore fell from 69% to 56%. Overall losses over the three years have thus halved from €1.4 billion to €731 million.
These are some of the most significant findings from the recently published 15th edition of ReportCalcio, the annual report on Italian and international football developed by the FIGC Research Center in collaboration with Arel (Research and Legislation Agency) and PwC Italia. "An unparalleled tool for transparency and analysis," emphasized Federation President Gabriele Gravina, "in terms of the amount of information and depth of topics covered, it is by far the most comprehensive and exhaustive study on the Italian football movement, which consistently represents the national sporting benchmark in terms of number of registered members, economic value generated, and the dissemination of social projects. A document that identifies strategies and proposes medium- to long-term solutions, also thanks to an in-depth international benchmarking study, to ensure real and stable development for the entire system." Our priorities are: decisive investment in facilities, also thanks to the UEFA Euro 2032 bid process, which is stimulating virtuous paths in several Italian cities, and in reforms regarding economic and financial sustainability, because the improvement in the critical scenario in the last two sporting seasons is due to the increase in the value of production and is not yet structured enough to secure the Italian football finances.
In the 2023-24 season, revenue growth was evident across nearly every category: revenue from sponsorships and commercial activities exceeded €1 billion for the first time in ReportCalcio's history (an 11.1% increase compared to 2022-23, and more than tripled over the 17-year period analyzed). Television rights remained essentially stable at €1.5 billion (-0.4%), while ticketing revenues once again hit Italian football's all-time high, nearly half a billion euros (€478 million), thanks in part to the significant growth in stadium attendance in the post-COVID-19 era. Considering domestic leagues and European cups, attendance in 2023-24 reached 21 million spectators, another record in ReportCalcio's history, compared to 20.3 million in 2022-23 and 15.8 million pre-COVID-19.
Serie A's average attendance, in particular, was the highest since the 1992-93 season, with 31,172 fans and the highest total attendance (over 11.8 million) since 1978-79. For the second consecutive year, Serie A surpassed the Spanish La Liga in attendance (14.42 million spectators across league, domestic, and European cups), trailing only the Bundesliga (14.44 million) and the Premier League (18.5 million). Three Italian clubs also feature in the top 10 European Top League clubs with the highest total attendances in the 2023-24 season: Inter Milan in second place (1.4 million, only Manchester United had a better record), AC Milan in fifth (1.3 million), and Roma in seventh (1.2 million).
The financial and attendance results are also linked to the growth in Italian football's international competitiveness. After appearing in three European cup finals in 2022-23, achieving a record-breaking UEFA Club Ranking and finishing second in Europe, in 2023-24, Italy secured first place in the seasonal rankings with 21,000 points (ahead of Germany with 19,357 and England with 17,375). This was also thanks to Atalanta's victory in the Europa League (their first European title and the first success for an Italian club since Parma's UEFA Cup win in 1999) and Fiorentina's reaching the Europa Conference League final. Thanks to the positive performances of Italian clubs in European competition (with six finals reached in just three years), Italy has qualified five clubs for the 2024-2025 edition of the Champions League, a competition in which Inter reached the final (their second in three seasons).
It's no coincidence, then, that Italian football is attracting increasing foreign investment, with 27 foreign ownerships in professional football (more than one in four clubs), 16 of which are from the United States. Between 2011 and 2024, total investment by foreign owners (in terms of recapitalizations) amounted to nearly €5 billion.
Football as an industrial sector
The Italian football industry's total direct revenues amount to nearly €7 billion, and the tax and social security contributions from the professional sector alone over the last 17 years have reached nearly €20 billion. For every euro invested by the Italian government in football (considering the contributions paid to the FIGC through CONI and Sport e Salute), the country has achieved a tax and social security return of €20.5, representing a formidable investment multiplier.
Of the more than 50,000 companies and organizations in the country's sports system, the 99 professional football clubs alone accounted for over 70% of the tax revenue generated by the Italian sports sector as a whole in 2022, a figure slightly down from 76.9% in 2021, which represented the highest percentage recorded since 2015.
Considering not only the direct value but also the indirect and induced impact football has on the entire value chain and the industrial sectors involved, the sport's impact on Italian GDP is estimated at €12.4 billion (an increase of over €1 billion compared to 2022-2023), with 141,000 jobs created (compared to 129,094 in 2022-2023). In short, football generates 1.2 out of every 200 GDP and supports 6 out of every 1,000 employed workers.
The main sectors impacted in terms of GDP are professional football, with €5.2 billion, youth and amateur football and the FIGC (€2.9 billion), football betting (€1.8 billion), sports newspapers and broadcasters (€1.2 billion), and football tourism (€1.3 billion). Regarding this last sector, the consumption incurred by the 21.3 million total spectators in stadiums in 2023-2024 (men's professional football and national teams) has been estimated; 43% of spectators are estimated to be Italians from outside the region and 25% are foreign fans; total tourism spending amounts to €1.3 billion (+33.2%), broken down into accommodation costs (€314 million), food and beverages (€542 million), and other expenses (transport and shopping, with €443 million).
Professional football, however, continues to suffer from significant economic and financial imbalances. The aggregate loss of clubs participating in Serie A, B, and C over the 17 years analyzed in ReportCalcio reached €9.3 billion, significantly impacted by the three seasons affected by COVID-19 (which saw a total loss of €3.6 billion, an average of approximately €3.3 million per day). Over the 17-year period covered by ReportCalcio, 80% of financial statements closed with losses (1,289 financial statements in the red compared to the 1,609 analyzed), a figure that rose to 82.6% during the COVID-19 period.
Aggregate debt doubled in the pre-pandemic phase, going from €2.4 billion in 2007-2008 to €4.8 billion in 2018-2019, before growing further to €5.5 billion in 2023-2024. In 2007-2008, revenues covered 97% of debt; in 2023-2024, this percentage dropped to 83%.
Over the last 18 years (2007-2024), 226 new stadiums have been built in Europe, with an investment of 25.3 billion. The leading nations in terms of new stadiums are Poland and Turkey (over 30 new stadiums), ahead of Germany (19) and Russia (16). Italy, with the 6 new stadiums inaugurated in this period (Juventus, Udinese, Frosinone, Albinoleffe, Südtirol and Atalanta), has only tapped a minimal part of this potential, accounting for just 1% of the total investments produced in Europe.
The average age at which stadiums are inaugurated in Italy ranges from 56 in Serie A to 74 in Serie B. The percentage of seats covered in Serie B and C ranges between 49% and 37%, rising to 77% in Serie A. Meanwhile, only 22% of stadiums in the top professional division use renewable energy sources, and just 8% of Italian professional football stadiums are not publicly owned.
These numbers demonstrate the need for a new generation of sports facilities, which could bring significant added value to the football sector, but also to the entire country. Specifically, it is estimated that, if completed, the 31 projects for new football stadiums in Italy currently in the planning or construction phase (820,000 seats) would require a total investment of €5.1 billion, with an additional impact on GDP of €6.1 billion, primarily in the construction, manufacturing, and professional sectors, and the creation of approximately 80,000 new jobs. A positive impact is also estimated in terms of a potential increase in stadium attendance (+1.2 million) and direct economic benefits (ticketing, tourism spending, and sponsorships, for a total increase of €562 million).
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