English Premier League clubs splurged a record £870 million ($1.3 billion) on new talent during this summer's transfer window. However, that figure could have been £85 million ($130 million) higher were it not thanks to the weakness of the euro and the strength of sterling.
Top-flight English clubs spent £483 million ($738 million) on players from clubs in the eurozone this summer, with the pound trading at around 1.40 euros and reaching a high of 1.44 euros. However, the same batch of players would have cost £568 million ($868 million) in the 2014 summer transfer window, when the pound was worth around 1.25 euros, according to analysis by forex broker Foenix Partners reported by City A.M.
The saving equates to £85 million, just under the world record fee of £85.3 million ($130 million) which took Gareth Bale to Real Madrid from Tottenham Hotspur in September 2013. Savings for English clubs were boosted by the fact that transfers usually occur in the currency of the selling club.
However, some clubs that moved early in the window, which ran from midnight on July 1 to 6 pm on September 1, or organized their transfers by the process of forward booking—where a fixed rate is agreed months or weeks before the purchase actually occurs—may have lost out on savings due to further falls in the value of the euro.
Tuesday's last-gasp dealings brought a close to the English transfer window and set a new record for calendar year spending, which passed the £1 billion ($1.5 billion) mark for the first time. This summer's spending represented a 4 percent increase on last summer, and Premier League clubs spent more than double than their closest rivals in Italy's Serie A, who spent £405 million ($619 million), the BBC reported.
Business Insider also reported that the sum spent by Premier League teams was more than the GDP of 18 countries—including Antigua and Barbuda, Gambia and Samoa—according to World Bank figures.
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Conor is a staff writer for Newsweek covering Africa, with a focus on Nigeria, security and conflict.
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