World football clubs spent a record $9.63 billion on players in international transfer contracts managed by FIFA last year, according to research released on Tuesday by football’s governing body.
Ahead of a slow January trading window closing in Europe on Thursday, FIFA’s research revealed that transfer spending in 2023 on player deals between clubs from different countries — driven by spending by English and Saudi Arabian clubs — was $2 billion higher than the previous highest spend in the pre-pandemic year of 2019.
With $2.96 billion in international deals, English clubs were once again the top spenders. Famous players were Joško Gvardiol, who transferred from Leipzig to Manchester City, Mykhailo Mudryk, who transferred from Shakhtar Donetsk to Chelsea and Enzo Fernandez, who transferred from Benfica to Chelsea.
FIFA’s analysis does not provide an entire picture because it does not include transfers between clubs within the same nation. FIFA did not record the hundreds of millions of dollars spent on Declan Rice, Alexis MacAllister, Moises Caicedo and Kai Havertz since the transfers were between Premier League clubs. These contracts do not require FIFA to conduct a change of player registration between two member federations.
According to FIFA’s report, Saudi clubs spent $970 million, compared to $50.4 million in 2022, and recouped $16.9 million by selling players to clubs in other nations.
In women’s football, FIFA processed 1,888 international transfers of professional players last year, a more than 20% increase from the previous year.