Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) announced a record-breaking USD 9.63 billion spend on football deals in 2023. FIFA revealed their official Global Transfer Report 2023 on Tuesday which highlighted an eye-widening rise in transfer amounts in major leagues in the world.
According to the FIFA report, teams spent $9.63 billion on football transfers with an increase of 48.1% compared to 2022. The 2023 report also surpassed the previous net spending record in 2019 when teams stunned the world by splashing USD 2 billion.
As expected, FA's English Premier League alone contributed a staggering $2.9 billion in 2023. Top Premier League clubs Manchester United, Chelsea and Manchester City registered some of the biggest deals last year with the Blues' signing Enzo being among the most expensive signings.
Apart from EPL, the Saudi Sarabia Saudi Pro League witnessed a sharp rise in spending as the cash-rich league reported $970m spent (fifth highest by associations) in 2023. German football clubs (majorly from the Bundesliga) received the highest USD 1.2 billion in transfer fees followed by France ($1.19 billion), England ($1.04 billion) and Italy ($1.02 billion).
"German clubs topped the list for transfer fees received from outgoing transfers with a total of more than USD 1.2 billion," a FIFA media release statement said. "Just as in the previous year, Portuguese clubs completed more incoming transfers than clubs from any other association (1,017). Brazilian clubs, on the other hand, released the highest number of players (1,217).
"A total of 1,024 clubs spent money on international transfers in 2023, the first-ever time that more than 1,000 clubs invested in transfer fees for new players from abroad. The number of clubs that received transfer fees, 1,241, was also another new high."
Meanwhile, FIFA also revealed the top ten deals in 2023 without disclosing transfer fees. West London giants Chelsea were involved in two of the top five biggest deals in 2023 where they signed FIFA World Cup 2022 hero Enzo Fernandez and Ukranian forward Mykhailo Mudryk.
