UPDATE :Arsenal are watching developments between Liverpool and teenage winger Rio Ngumoha

The staggering numbers behind Premier League’s spending power over Europe

Nicol backs Man City to compete for the title after Fernandez signing (1:30

How should we describe the 2026 summer transfer window? Basically, more of the same. The Premier League throws money around with abandon, while the other top European leagues either skimp or take in far more than they spend.

It’s not a new phenomenon — in fact, we’re so used to it that we’ve become desensitized to the sheer scale. So let’s remind ourselves, using data from Transfermarkt, with the usual disclaimers.

Most of this data isn’t public because clubs often don’t announce fees, there will be currency fluctuations, and some of the spending relates to commitments made the previous season — the infamous “loan with an obligation to make the transfer permanent,” which is nothing more than an accounting trick.

Still, it’s the best, most comprehensive database out there, and the numbers are so staggering that a few dozen million either way won’t move the needle.

The English top flight recorded a net spend of €1.539 billion, a slight increase from the €1.516 billion shelled out last season.

Italy’s Serie A came in a distant second at €420 million, ahead of La Liga’s €252 million. The other members of the so-called Big Five leagues? Well, they actually made money: the Bundesliga took in €44 million more than it spent, and Ligue 1 pulled in a whopping €740 million more in transfer fees than it spent on transfers.

This is very much a trend, too. Over the past five seasons, the Premier League’s net spend stands at €6.4 billion, Serie A is at €945 million and LaLiga is at €141 million. The other two are in the black: the Bundesliga at €523 million and Ligue 1 at €1.03 billion.

It’s not surprising that the Premier League should spend more money on transfers than anyone else. According to Deloitte’s Annual Review of Football Finance, its revenue in 2024-25 was €8.09 billion, dwarfing the Bundesliga (€4.25 billion), LaLiga (€4.1 billion), Serie A (€3 billion) and Ligue 1 (€2.2 billion).

But the scale of the net transfer spending — especially in this era of financial sustainability rules — is remarkable. The Premier League earns roughly twice as much as LaLiga, for example, yet its net spend was six times higher this summer and 11 times higher over the past five years.

It becomes even more remarkable when you consider other factors at play this past summer.

Chelsea and Aston Villa were under settlement agreements with UEFA after breaching financial sustainability rules, and as a result, those clubs had to stay within certain transfer spend targets or they would face fines and/or other punishments. Everton and Newcastle were in danger of breaching those same rules. All four curbed their spending significantly — Chelsea, Everton and Aston Villa made money in the transfer window, while Newcastle’s net spend was a relatively contained €33.9 million.

Barcola’s big move from PSG to Liverpool was a major contributor to another summer of transfers in which the Premier League effectively subsidized big European leagues such as Ligue 1. Karl Bridgeman

What’s more, the numbers for certain leagues are juiced by the presence of certain superclubs — Barcelona and Real Madrid in LaLiga, Bayern and Paris Saint Germain in France — that are revenue powerhouses equal to or greater than the Premier League’s “Big Six” (traditionally defined as Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool, Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham). Take Barcelona and Real Madrid out of the mix in Spain, and you go from a net spend of €252 million to a transfer profit of €9 million. Ignore Bayern in Germany, and the league’s transfer profit is around €100 million.

In France, it’s a bit of a different story. Following the collapse of Ligue 1’s TV deal, even normally profligate PSG wheeled and dealed their way to a whopping transfer profit of €182 million. It’s not an exaggeration to suggest that the Premier League is effectively bankrolling Ligue 1, given that almost France’s entire transfer surplus (€740 million) is down to the fact that teams transferred players to English top-flight clubs for €684.8 million more than what they got in return. (And what they got in return, by the way, was juiced by the transfers of Omari Kellyman and Deivid Washington from Chelsea to Strasbourg, two clubs owned by the same people, for a combined €22 million.)