making the bed
Everton’s 2024/25 financial results covered an important season in the club’s recent history, as The Friedkin group (TFG) bought out former owner Farhad Moshiri in December 2024.
This brought some much needed stability after a worrying period that included large financial losses, an ever increasing debt burden and two separate points deductions for breaching the Premier League’s Profitability and Sustainability Regulations (PSR).
This was also the final set of accounts before the club moved to its impressive new stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock.
The other significant change last season was the decision to bring back David Moyes as manager, after Sean Dyche was sacked with Everton dangerously close to the drop. The “Moyesiah” steered the club to safety, finishing in a respectable 13th place, thus confirming that the first season of the new stadium would be in the top flight.
Everton had steadily declined from an impressive fifth place in 2013/14 to narrowly avoiding relegation in 2022/23, though results have been much better this season, so much so that they have an outside chance of qualifying for Europe.
Ownership
Friedkin purchased Moshiri’s 94.1% holding, then converted the £451m shareholder loan into equity, raising the stake to 97.2%, while finally making an additional equity injection to repay third party debt and satisfy working capital requirements, giving a total shareholding of 99.5%.
Everton fans will have breathed a sigh of relief, not only because this brought an end to Moshiri’s uncomfortable tenure, but also because they managed to dodge a couple of bullets, as there had been discussions with 777 Partners and John Textor’s Eagle Football Holding, both of which have essentially collapsed since then.
However, Dan Friedkin is clearly cut from different cloth, having already demonstrated his willingness to invest in AS Roma. In fact, the American businessman has already provided more than €800m of funding to the Serie A side.
The change in ownership has also had a major impact on Everton’s finances, which can be seen by a review of their accounts for the 2024/25 season, when they also reached the fourth round of the FA Cup and third round of the Carabao Cup.
Profit/(Loss) 2024/25
The good news is that Everton’s pre-tax loss “significantly reduced” from £53.2m to just £8.6m, which the club said reflected “a year of stabilisation, growth and structural reset”.
However, it’s worth noting that this improvement owed a great deal to the £49m profit they made on the sale of a couple of investments to another group company, namely the women’s team and Goodison Park Stadium Limited.
If those in-house asset sales were excluded, Everton’s pre-tax loss would actually have increased from £53.2m to £57.8m.
That said, the underlying position was still better, as the operating loss narrowed from £82.3m to £64.7m, a 21% (£17.6m) reduction.
This was driven by a new club record for revenue, which rose £9.8m (5%) from £186.9m to £196.7m, while operating expenses fell £7.8m (3%) from £269.2m to £261.4m.
On the other hand, exceptional charges slightly increased from £10.4m to £11.2m, while net interest payable was up £4.1m (45%) from £9.1m to £13.2m.
In addition, profit on player sales was down by a third, falling from £48.5m to £31.3m.
The revenue increase was almost entirely driven by commercial, which rose £8.7m (22%) from £38.5m to £47.2m, though gate receipts also increased by £1.2m (6%) from £19.1m to £20.3m. Broadcasting was flat at £129.2m.
Everton made inroads into their staff costs, as the wage bill fell £4.5m (3%) from £156.6m to £152.1m, while player amortisation was slashed £13.7m (21%) from £64.6m to £50.9m. However, other expenses shot up £11.5m (26%) from £44.3m to £55.8m.
On paper, Everton’s £9m loss was one of the best results in the Premier League last season, as many clubs lost significantly more money. Chelsea posted an incredible £262m loss, followed by Tottenham £121m, West Ham £104m, Nottingham Forest £79m and Leicester City £71m.