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Newcastle United owners PIF expanding football empire as six deals struck and one more imminent

Adam Williams

Thu 5 December 2024 18:00, UK

As the jewel in the Saudi Public Investment Fund’s crown, Newcastle United have a direct line to the most powerful network in all of sport.

The £305m that PIF spent alongside the Rueben Brothers and PCP Capital Partners to acquire Newcastle in October 2021 is utterly dwarfed by most investme🎶nts in sovereign wealth fওund’s portfolio.

PIF are used to dealing in billions, not millions. Some of their so-called giga-projectღs – such as ‘The Line’ and ‘NEOM’ – will in fact run into the trillions.

Newcastle meanwhile deliver comparably miniscule revenu🐭e and have lost £200m over🐎 the last four published financial years.

But the Magpies’ success to Yasir Al-Rumayyan and his peers at PIF HQ us gauged not on a conven𓆉tional ROI basis but rather in terms of the influence and cultural capital that the club delivers.

The party line from PIF themselves is thaꦬt Newcastle are a business investment like any other, one who that run with a view to ♛capital appreciation. In layman’s terms, increasing its value. Buy low, sell high.

But the club themselves have always maintained that Eddie Howe and Paul Mitchell will spend the absolute maximum amount allowed under Profit and Sustainability Rules, or PSR.

That means Newcastle will always be at the very lim♊it of the three-year £105m allowable loss limit each and every season.

If a business purposefully loses the maximum it is allowed to within the Premier League’s regulatory framework, that d🙈oesn’t exactly look like it is putting itself in the shop window for w♏ould-be buyers.

For a football club, this mod꧟el is the holy grail for many fans. It effectively means that the owners will spare no expense to deliver success on the pitch.

With Howe’s side in the middle of what so far has been a relatively insipid season, PIF bringing s🍌ilverware to St James’ Park might seem a remote possibility at present.

Position	Team	Played MP	Won W	Drawn D	Lost L	For GF	Against GA	Diff GD	Points Pts
5	BrightonBrighton	13	6	5	2	22	17	5	23
6	Nottm ForestNottingham Forest	14	6	4	4	16	16	0	22
7	Aston VillaAston Villa	14	6	4	4	22	23	-1	22
8	TottenhamTottenham	13	6	2	5	28	14	14	20
9	BrentfordBrentford	14	6	2	6	27	26	1	20
10	NewcastleNewcastle	14	5	5	4	17	17	0	20
11	Man UtdManchester United	14	5	4	5	17	15	2	19
12	FulhamFulham	13	5	4	4	18	18	0	19
13	B’mouthBournemouth	13	5	3	5	20	19	1	18
14	West HamWest Ham	14	4	3	7	18	27	-9	15

But th𝔍e institution’s influence, capital and ambition surely dictate that, at some point, real and sustained success on the pitch will come.

Newcastle are far from the only in😼vestment that PIF look at through an unconventional business lens.

When they host the World Cup in 2034, they will do so at a financial loss. That, like many of the📖ir dizzyingly ambitious projects, is instead an exercise in nat𒈔ion-branding.

As geopolitics expert Professor Simon Chadwick wrote recently for , nation-branding is “critical [to] the kingdom’s✨ broader goals of economic diversification, global influenc🍸e and societal transformation.”

✤And devཧelopments this week sharply illustrate how central football is to this aim.

• READ MORE: Newcastle United and PIF tippꦛed to ‘go nuclear’ as £300m budget boost mooted

PIF’s astonishing network of football deals and partnerships revealed

So far, Newcastle are the only club directly owned🅘 by the Saudi Public Investment Fund.

However, the mood music since the takeover has 🌌always been that they intend to expand their network within the sp♔ort, with Newcastle likely to sit at the apex of a multi-club structure.

But𒆙 straight-up takeovers are not the only means through which PIF’s tentacles are now stretching across the sport.

An astonishing body of research from , who describe themselves as an ‘initiative promoting democracy, transparency, aꦅnd freedom of expression in world sport’, reveals the ℱextent of their influence.

The report details 1,412 key posit꧑ions that Saudi Arabia hold wit𝓡hin sport along with 910 sponsorship agreements.

Also detailed is the strategic partnerships th🅺at the Gulf state with football clubs.

In total, six clubs – Sevilla, Espanyol, Valencia, Sporting, Juventus and FK Sarajevo – have linked up with Saudi Arabia in some🍎 footballing capacity.

While Newcastle are the standard bearer for the nation’s involvement in the sport, 🦹they are uꦉltimately just one cog in what is now a monumentally powerful global machine.

• READ MORE: Newcastle Unite🐎d should be allowed to strike £90m deal as PSR ‘upper limit’ ꧟unlocked

Newcastle United, the next multi-club experiment? PIF target takeover in Brazil

Since the earliest days of PIF’s reign on Tyneside, they have signalled 🥂that the deal to take over Newcastle will not be their last.෴

PIF have been linked with taking over AS Monaco, for example, as well as a numᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚber of clubs previously owned by the now-liquidated 777 P🐻artners.

In the latest neꦯws, South American outlet are now reporting that Brazilian side Santa Cruz are now in PIF’s crosshairs.

Interestingly, that would see PIF go up against a rival Guld s🥃tate in the United Arab Emirates, whose Abu Dhabi royal family are the de-facto owners of both Man City and Brazilian club Bahia.

• READ MORE: Arne Slot blown away by what one Newcastle player did during 3-3 Liv﷽erpool draw

Could an independent regulator force PIF out of Newcastle?

In a��n initiative almost universally ꧂opposed within the Premier League, a bill to introduce an independent regulator for English football is currently making its way through Parliament.

The regulator has cross-party support and will likely have the power to influence financial distribution talks and safeguard the i꧃nterests of fans in terms of club colours or breakaway leagues.

However, the finer points are yet to be ironed out and the Premier League is lobbying hard to have the bill watered down as m๊uch as possible.

Conversely, House of Lords peer Steve Bassam has proposed an amendment that would effe𒉰ctively see state-affiliated ownership of clubs outlawed.

Headlin𒈔es about PIF being ousted from St James’ Park rang alarm bells for Newcastle fans, but is that likely?

Not according to Liverpool University football finance expert Kieran Maguire, who told TBR Football that FIFA’s 🌞backstop powers would likely act as a bulwark against Lord Bassam🐟’s proposal.

“Ironically, the people that want to destroy the regulator are probably the most in favour of this,” he said.

“It is likely to ring alarm bells at FIFA, who do not allow government interference in football.

“I cannot see this making progress. To say that state ownership in football is more distasteful than the people behind Super League seems to me to be inconsistent.

“There is a broader issue in terms of human rights that needs to be discussed, but if you are going to allow overseas investment buying the priciest real estate in London, there is an inconsistency there too.

“There will be some toing-and-froing between the Lords and the Commons, but I imagine that FIFA will be whispering in the era of the government that this would be unacceptable.

“The governments of Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia will also want to have diplomatic lines address too. These are trading partners of the UK and other industries benefit from exporting to the region.”