The 2026 World Cup is set to be the most lucrative ever for FIFA – and by quite a margin, too.
Three-and-a-half years ago in Qatar, world football’s governing body trousered $7bn in revenue for its four-year financial cycle, up from $5.3bn in Russia in 2018.
For the cycle encompassing the tournament in the US, Canada and Mexico – which, as the most nakedly commercial in history, is every bit as controversial as those last two World Cups – FIFA is projecting $13bn. That’s a markup of 45 per cent.
Per the organisation’s most recent financial report, Infantino and his peers in the FIFA boardroom are expecting ticketing and hospitality income to treble, from $950m to $3bn; broadcast rights to rise from $3.1bn to $4.3bn; and to add $1bn in sponsorship revenue, taking its total to $3.8bn.
Most of the remaining value came from the Club World Cup, also staged in the US, last summer.
That event was seen as a dry run for 2026. Exorbitant ticket prices (dictated by dynamic pricing and both authorised and unauthorised scalpers), hydration breaks (which split the action across 90 minutes into four quarters and allow broadcasters to air more adverts) and sweetheart commercial deals (with Gulf state-backed companies like Aramco and Qatar Airways) were debuted there.
Amid the storm and incredulity and fury that has greeted FIFA’s profiteering, however, the question of how Infantino actually intends to spend the money from the World Cup has arguably been missed.
FIFA is a non-profit. It pays handsome salaries to the likes of Infantino, who earned about $6m last year, yes. But after it has paid its staff and covered its operating costs, profits are distributed to the football associations of its 211 member nations, which the organisation regularly boasts are more numerous than their counterparts in the United Nations.
Speaking exclusively to HITC, Professor Kieran Maguire – a football finance expert, author and podcast host in the UK – has explained how FIFA will distribute the money.
“Whilst FIFA will be delighted with the significant increase in revenues, they have to acknowledge that their cost base will be higher too,” he said. “There are more teams to cover, more clubs entitled to compensation.
“However, that will probably take no more than 10 per cent of the revenues from the competition. Even if you accept that running costs for the expanded tournament are higher, FIFA are still going to be looking at probably a $10bn profit.
“FIFA is very democratic in the way it distributes money. It is spread out on an individual basis, per national football association. We have seen in recent tournaments that member nations get more money when FIFA is successful.
“We don’t know how that money is audited or what FIFA’s long-term plans are, however.
“We have to remember that they no longer have the naming rights for the video game. When they broke off their relationship with EA, they said they were going to replace with a better game, but that hasn’t materialised. The women’s World Cup loses money, too. And the FIFA Club World Cup only broke even on the basis of a very unusual, late TV deal with DAZN.
“So there is certainly scope to distribute significantly higher sums to member nations. That is also why Infantino will be the president until 2031. The election will probably be uncontested because, as far as individual associations are concerned, he has delivered on his promise to increase their money, which in turn allows them to invest in grassroots football and enhance the overall growth of the game.”
