English football's financial bleeding has ballooned alongside a regulatory crackdown on crypto exchange partnerships that fund the beautiful game.
The Premier League, the most lucrative football league on Earth, is hemorrhaging money at an alarming rate. Combined pre-tax losses for the 2024-25 season ballooned to roughly £787-795 million, up from just £154-155 million the prior year.
The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority has started raising red flags about cryptocurrency sponsorships in football, singling out partnerships with exchanges like BingX and OKX.
How the Premier League burned through record revenue #
The league collectively generated around £6.8 billion in revenue during the period. Soaring wages, inflated transfer amortization costs, and ballooning agent fees ate through every pound and then some. Underlying operating losses, which strip out player trading, hit £1.65 billion. That’s a 43% climb year-over-year.
Chelsea led the charge into the financial abyss with a single-club pre-tax loss of £262.4 million, setting a new Premier League record. The previous holder of that dubious honor was Manchester City, which posted a £197.5 million deficit back in the 2010-11 season.
This marks the seventh consecutive season of aggregate losses across the league. Cumulative deficits now exceed £4 billion.
Newcastle, Aston Villa, and Everton used one-off internal asset sales to shore up their balance sheets. Without those tactics, the headline numbers would look even worse.
The crypto sponsorship problem #
Chelsea extended its sponsorship deal with BingX in April 2026, doubling down on a crypto partnership at a time when the club was posting record losses.
In June 2026, the FCA issued warnings about football clubs partnering with unregulated crypto exchanges, explicitly naming BingX and OKX as examples.
OKX’s deal with Manchester City and BingX’s arrangement with Chelsea gave these platforms visibility among millions of fans. If the FCA starts forcing clubs to drop these partnerships, exchanges lose one of their most effective marketing channels in Europe.
What this means for investors #
If the FCA moves beyond warnings and into enforcement, exchanges sponsoring English football clubs could face compliance costs, fines, or forced withdrawal from the UK market. The flip side is that well-regulated, compliant exchanges could actually benefit. If the FCA clears the field of unregulated competitors, exchanges with proper licensing could step in as the only viable sponsors, consolidating sponsorship spending among fewer, larger platforms.
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