Norwich City FC have wiped out all of their external debt and returned a small profit after tax of £500,000, the Premier League club revealed on Thursday in accounts published for the year end May 31, 2013 (which cover a 13-month period).
This is before the effects of the Premier League’s new television deal show up in the accounts. The £49m the club received for television rights last season will rise to somewhere between £62m and £64m, with an extra £1.25m for every position above 20th the club achieves.
Norwich City FC have wiped out all of their external debt and returned a small profit after tax of £500,000, the Premier League club revealed on Thursday in accounts published for the year end May 31, 2013 (which cover a 13-month period).
This is before the effects of the Premier League’s new television deal show up in the accounts. The £49m the club received for television rights last season will rise to somewhere between £62m and £64m, with an extra £1.25m for every position above 20th the club achieves.
Overall revenue at Carrow Road was up to £78.7m from £74.3m in 2012, with a profit of £500,000 which was down from £13.5m as the club moved to slash external debt from £11.3m to some £900,000, with £700,000 of that as “preference shares” and the remaining balance now paid off since 1 June.
The club had loans of £23m four years ago, but now only owes interest free money to directors. Following relegation to League One in 2009, the Canaries were in a desperate financial position, struggling to meet the payments on the £23m worth of debt.
Despite their record of financial success, plans to expand Carrow Road have been deferred. The 27,000 capacity is relatively small for the top flight and is regularly sold out. Rebuilding the City stand would increase capacity to 32,000.
However, that would require a 20-year, £30m, mortgage and losing up to 6,000 seats for an entire season. For now the priority is investing in the staff and academy to secure the club’s position in the Premier League. There was £19.7m of player investment in the last financial year, up from £10.4m.
Wages increased from £29.6m to £45.9m which represents 63 per cent of revenue. This is over the recommended 50 per cent level, but that is not unusual for top flight clubs who need to spend to retain the revenues that membership of the Premier League brings. Taken overall, this is an excellent set of results for a well-run club.