By DPA
Madrid : Spanish league champions Real Madrid have made a pre-tax profit of around 44 million euros in the 2006-07 season, reporting a 20 percent increase in their income over the previous season.
In a financial report published late Monday, the club said they had taken in 351 million euros ($478.54 million) last season, a one-fifth increase over 2005-06.
This income mostly comes from three areas, more or less evenly divided among ticket sales at the Estadio Bernabeu plus money paid for friendly matches away from home, television rights and merchandising.
And this despite having spent almost 100 million euros on buying players when Fabio Capello was coach, and despite the club’s sky-high wages bill.
After announcing the figures, Real president Ramon Calderon commented: “These historic results would never have been achieved without the policy of financial rigour and discipline followed by the board, and without the serious and professional first-class management of this club, whose competence is comparable with that of any big multinational enterprise.”
Calderon added that Real had a management team “capable of proportioning a solid economic base, which will make possible the development of the club and create the material conditions necessary to facilitate sporting success.”