UEFA vs FIFA: European Governing Body To Launch Valuation Probe Into $20bn Controversial World Cup Plan

Gianni Infantino's controversial FIFA World Cup plan has dented his reputation to a greater extent. The FIFA chief had proposed launching a commercial entity called FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) to manage marquee events like the World Cup and the Club World Cup. The initial plan was to sell up to a 20% stake, raising up to the tune of $4.2 billion, but after severe backlash, that plan has now been shelved.

UEFA Launches New Investigation Into FIFA's World Cup Plan

Criticism from all levels flew in and UEFA were at the forefront with a more straightforward stance against the FIFA boss. They criticised the World Cup plans with all their might and remained unmoved despite Infantino's apology letter to 211 members on Tuesday.

Now, as per the Guardian, UEFA has decided to launch an investigation into how FIFA reached a valuation of $20 billion. FIFA has generated roughly $15 billion in the four-year cycle which concluded with the World Cup very recently. As per the report, UEFA has already been in conversation with several market analysts and eyebrows have been raised on how they reached the $20 billion mandate.

A source told the Guardian, “We need to find out if they were selling the World Cup at a knockdown price. How did they get to $20bn? Was it a robust process?

“The World Cup is the only genuinely global mass entertainment event so an increase of $5bn on current revenues seems low to me. This looks like a low-ball offer. The obvious financial upside of further expansion that the investors would demand – more teams, more regular World Cups, more Club World Cups – is not priced in.”

FIFA Denied Gianni Infantino Sought Donald Trump Intervention

There were also reports that Infantino reached out to US President Donald Trump and sought an appointment with Secretary of State Marco Rubio. But FIFA rejected all the allegations. A FIFA source spoke to Fox News and confirmed there has been no contact—scheduled or otherwise—with Rubio or officials in the Trump administration.

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