Seven years ago, Massimo Moratti took the painful decision to sell Inter. The club had an overall balance down by €80m and the team was not doing well in the competitions.
Seven years later, Zhang Steven has announced the best financial year yet for our glorious club, with a record for our revenues that reached €417m.
Inter financial report indicates still an overall loss of €48.4m, with personnel costs at €192.6m, with the latest expenses caused by the contract renewals signed by Joao Mario and Ivan Perisic before being loaned out with option to buy by their new clubs. Their contracts will run out in 2022.
It is important to indicate that Suning sponsorship to the club not the main cause of this growth, with the internal sponsorship limited at the 30% by the UEFA Financial Fair Play.
Also, Inter has invested money to buy back the retail and licensing rights from Nike. This will not influence the relationship with the American sportswear brand, as this procedure has become common in football, but will allow Suning to be a direct distributor of Inter clothing product in China, with a direct gain for the club.
Another great financial result is the income from us tifosi, the supporters that fill up San Siro in every game. The average attendance reached 61419, making Inter the fifth most followed club in Europe, and the first in Italy.
On the stadium front, the Milan City Council has recently approved Inter and A.C. new stadium project with 27 yes, 11 no and 7 abstained.
Although the yes is conditioned by 16 requests that the clubs must follow if they go on and build the stadium within the Council borders. The three main points are that the Giuseppe Meazza cannot be demolished or torn apart to be recycled in the new stadium project. Also, whatever firm gets the green light to build the stadium as to scale down their ambition, as the building space allowed has been reduced. Third main request is that the green areas must be increased.
Inter and A.C. have still a Plan B in their sleeves but they will keep negotiating with the Council, as they would prefer remaining in the San Siro neighborhood.
