July 31 (Reuters) – FIFA’s plan to sell a piece of its business empire to outside investors has collapsed following an open revolt by soccer officials worldwide and a major rift among top FIFA executives, the New York Post reported on Friday.
The deal, in which FIFA had aimed to raise up to $4.2 billion by selling a roughly 20% stake in the group, valuing the new arm at $20 billion, is no longer active, the report said, citing four sources familiar with the matter.
Reuters could not immediately verify the report. World soccer’s governing body FIFA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The proposal, which came out on Tuesday, was met with immediate resistance led by European soccer ruling body UEFA, which accused FIFA of putting the sport’s “soul” up for sale.
On Thursday, UEFA’s 55 member nations voted unanimously to boycott all FIFA tournaments, less than two weeks after Spain’s men’s team were crowned world champions.
Carlos Cordeiro, a senior advisor to FIFA President Gianni Infantino, quit on Friday in protest at the plan and FIFA’s Chief Operating Officer Kevin Lamour said staff were “deceived” by Infantino, describing the proposal as a “project of one person”.
FIFA has proposed creating a $20-billion subsidiary, FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), to run the World Cup and its other events, but the non-profit insisted that “nobody is selling football” and the deal had been mischaracterised in the press.
Thrive Eternal, a fund run by Thrive Capital, founded by Joshua Kushner, was expected to lead the proposed investor group, FIFA said. Joshua is the brother of Jared Kushner, U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law.
Infantino said in a letter to all member associations that they would receive $40 million each if they agreed to FIFA’s proposal by September 19.
FIFA said it would not go ahead with the plan without the support of the majority of its member associations.
(Reporting by Mrinmay Dey in Mexico City and Rory Carroll; Editing by Mark Porter)
Comments