SKA (KHL) earned $124M in 2018-2019 season

[Kshahdoo]

Net income was $8.35M. Source. And Interfax is pretty reliable new agency. CSKA, on the other side, had $41M of net loss...

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[tony d]

Good news I guess. I had heard that the league may have been having money issues in the past. People can correct me if I'm wrong on this.

 

[Kshahdoo]

Good news I guess. I had heard that the league may have been having money issues in the past. People can correct me if I'm wrong on this.

Well, the KHL is pretty polarized, but SKA is few levels above any KHL team business wise (being the only hockey team in 5M+ megalapolis helps, of course). And the team will get 22k arena in a few years (right now it has 12.5k arena)...

If we compare SKA to NHL teams in 2018 year by revenue, then it would be above Arizona, Florida, Columbus, Carolina, Colorado and NYI, sharing 24-25 place with Ottawa.

 

[Burke the Legend]

Any other European clubs with revenue close to SKA level? I think it would be pretty interesting for European hockey if they could get 8-10 together and form a European super league that could actually be considered a "major league" of hockey. It would give the sport a better profile to compete against soccer & basketball.

 

[Barclay Donaldson]

Any other European clubs with revenue close to SKA level? I think it would be pretty interesting for European hockey if they could get 8-10 together and form a European super league that could actually be considered a "major league" of hockey. It would give the sport a better profile to compete against soccer & basketball.

That's what the KHL was supposed to be. It failed on a massive level. European fans don't want to watch a super league in any sport. Look at the failed KHL teams in Praha, Poprad, Medvescak, Donbass, and Slovan Bratislava. Much like soccer, domestic competitions are much more important than international ones (save for the tournament competitions like the UEFA Champions League). People in Belarus don't care about a team a 10 hour flight away in Siberia nor should they. Jokerit is losing more than 15 million euros per year and can be put into the failed European category as well. That's why no team from anywhere else in Europe wants to join the KHL. SKA was the only team to make money, every other KHL team failed to turn a profit and would have folded by now if it weren't for their owners being government-owned companies who subsidize the losses since it is now seen as a social project.

Big teams with big arenas like Koln, Bern, Munchen, Salzburg, and the big Scandinavian teams don't want to join the KHL for these reasons. What you're proposing is what the KHL was supposed to be, except add 20-30 teams. It's good in theory but it doesn't work. It's uniform across European sports, every time a soccer super league gets brought up it gets shot down once people expose reality.

 

[Kshahdoo]

That's what the KHL was supposed to be. It failed on a massive level. European fans don't want to watch a super league in any sport. Look at the failed KHL teams in Praha, Poprad, Medvescak, Donbass, and Slovan Bratislava. Much like soccer, domestic competitions are much more important than international ones (save for the tournament competitions like the UEFA Champions League). People in Belarus don't care about a team a 10 hour flight away in Siberia nor should they. Jokerit is losing more than 15 million euros per year and can be put into the failed European category as well. That's why no team from anywhere else in Europe wants to join the KHL. SKA was the only team to make money, every other KHL team failed to turn a profit and would have folded by now if it weren't for their owners being government-owned companies who subsidize the losses since it is now seen as a social project.

Big teams with big arenas like Koln, Bern, Munchen, Salzburg, and the big Scandinavian teams don't want to join the KHL for these reasons. What you're proposing is what the KHL was supposed to be, except add 20-30 teams. It's good in theory but it doesn't work. It's uniform across European sports, every time a soccer super league gets brought up it gets shot down once people expose reality.

Well, European hockey overall doesn't have this kind of money, in the KHL or out of the KHL. As a guy said, the whole Swedish league had revenue of 160M euro in 2017-18, so you can't say, these teams make a lot of money domestically. Even the KHL hard salary cap (starting from 2020-21 season) is going to be almost 3 times higher, than your average SHL team's salary budget (and don't forget about 13% taxation in Russia). That's why foreing KHL teams failed and not because nobody cared about the league outside Russia.

 

[TheWhiskeyThief]

The numbers are a mess.

Profit of $8.4mm on $125mm in revenue where the salary cap is 1/10th their income? Even if everybody on the squad was on Datsyuk money they’d be at $96mm.

Where’s the money gone?

Are the U15 and up on $100k per player?

 

[Kshahdoo]

The numbers are a mess.

Profit of $8.4mm on $125mm in revenue where the salary cap is 1/10th their income? Even if everybody on the squad was on Datsyuk money they’d be at $96mm.

Where’s the money gone?

Are the U15 and up on $100k per player?

SKA had a salary budget of 30M+ euro in 2018-19 season, and you can imagine, it had other expenses (a lot of farm teams in the system, and they all are the same club, unlike in the NHL).

 

[Barclay Donaldson]

Well, European hockey overall doesn't have this kind of money, in the KHL or out of the KHL. As a guy said, the whole Swedish league had revenue of 160M euro in 2017-18, so you can't say, these teams make a lot of money domestically. Even the KHL hard salary cap (starting from 2020-21 season) is going to be almost 3 times higher, than your average SHL team's salary budget (and don't forget about 13% taxation in Russia). That's why foreing KHL teams failed and not because nobody cared about the league outside Russia.

No one cares about the league outside of Russia. The financial matters you've pointed out are completely accurate and valid, but you're missing a very important point. No one in Europe wants an international super league for any sport.

Lev Praha, one of the best teams in the KHL during their time in the league, had attendance and revenue that would have put them in the "middle of the pack" in the Czech league. 5,000 people per game average for a team that nearly was the Gagarin Cup winner during their second and final season. Because no Euro hockey fan cares about the league outside of Russia.

Jokerit Helsinki has lower attendance than when they were in they left the Liiga as not even the most popular team in Helsinki after years of perennial underachievement. Because no Euro hockey fan cares about the league outside of Russia.

Medveščak Zagreb averaged around 8,000 people per game in the Austrian league before joining the KHL, and immediately dropped several thousand and continued to descend until they left. Because no Euro hockey fan cares about the league outside of Russia.

Do you want me to continue?

 

[Kshahdoo]

No one cares about the league outside of Russia. The financial matters you've pointed out are completely accurate and valid, but you're missing a very important point. No one in Europe wants an international super league for any sport.

Lev Praha, one of the best teams in the KHL during their time in the league, had attendance and revenue that would have put them in the "middle of the pack" in the Czech league. 5,000 people per game average for a team that nearly was the Gagarin Cup winner during their second and final season. Because no Euro hockey fan cares about the league outside of Russia.

Jokerit Helsinki has lower attendance than when they were in they left the Liiga as not even the most popular team in Helsinki after years of perennial underachievement. Because no Euro hockey fan cares about the league outside of Russia.

Medveščak Zagreb averaged around 8,000 people per game in the Austrian league before joining the KHL, and immediately dropped several thousand and continued to descend until they left. Because no Euro hockey fan cares about the league outside of Russia.

Do you want me to continue?

Lev held a KHL attendance record (16k+) for awhile, Slovan was very popular (close to 10k attendance), when the team was competitive, Jokerit had 3 seasons with 10k+ attendance averagely, and is still the most popular Finnish team by far. Not sure, where did you take all those "facts"...

 

[David Dennison]

The numbers are a mess.

Profit of $8.4mm on $125mm in revenue where the salary cap is 1/10th their income? Even if everybody on the squad was on Datsyuk money they’d be at $96mm.

Where’s the money gone?

Are the U15 and up on $100k per player?

The gross revenue number seems high for a league that plays 2/3 the # of games in stadiums 2/3 the size of NHL rinks in a much, much poorer country. There's gotta be some #fancy accounting, additional revenues/expenses, etc.

 

[Barclay Donaldson]

Lev held a KHL attendance record (16k+) for awhile, Slovan was very popular (close to 10k attendance), when the team was competitive, Jokerit had 3 seasons with 10k+ attendance averagely, and is still the most popular Finnish team by far. Not sure, where did you take all those "facts"...

Lev held a on-time attendance record, and it was in game four of the finals in their last year. A year when, despite making it to the finals and being one of the best teams in Europe, their Sparta Praha rivals in the vastly inferior Czech league, had better attendance by 2,000 people per game.

If you want to pull one time attendance records, then Gelsenkirchen hosted over 70,000 people for the 2010 World Hockey Championships. Doesn't mean that a team would do well there. University of Michigan hosted over 100,000 people for one game in their football stadium, but expecting that to happen again isn't a wise choice. Juventus women team had 40,000 people for one game, doesn't mean that women's football would be a great investment.

Jokerit had three seasons with around 10,000 reported in attendance, watch any of the non-CKA games during that time and it's nowhere near that amount. They're in the middle of a meltdown. Not sure, where did you get all of those "inaccurate assumptions"... I've listed three teams with a statistically-proven descent in numbers after joining the KHL. That's a correlation. I can't find HC Donbass's numbers and Poprad's numbers suggest the foolishness of KHL ownership or else they would show my assertion as well. No one in Europe cares about the KHL.

 

[Kshahdoo]

Lev held a on-time attendance record, and it was in game four of the finals in their last year. A year when, despite making it to the finals and being one of the best teams in Europe, their Sparta Praha rivals in the vastly inferior Czech league, had better attendance by 2,000 people per game.

If you want to pull one time attendance records, then Gelsenkirchen hosted over 70,000 people for the 2010 World Hockey Championships. Doesn't mean that a team would do well there. University of Michigan hosted over 100,000 people for one game in their football stadium, but expecting that to happen again isn't a wise choice. Juventus women team had 40,000 people for one game, doesn't mean that women's football would be a great investment.

Jokerit had three seasons with around 10,000 reported in attendance, watch any of the non-CKA games during that time and it's nowhere near that amount. They're in the middle of a meltdown. Not sure, where did you get all of those "inaccurate assumptions"... I've listed three teams with a statistically-proven descent in numbers after joining the KHL. That's a correlation. I can't find HC Donbass's numbers and Poprad's numbers suggest the foolishness of KHL ownership or else they would show my assertion as well. No one in Europe cares about the KHL.

Lev was a gimmick team, that's why it failed. As to Jokerit, so you say, 2 home games with SKA is enough to get 10k average attendance on 13.3k arena? I mean, check Jokerit average attendance figures. They are very easy to find via Google...

 

[LeHab]

The numbers are a mess.

Profit of $8.4mm on $125mm in revenue where the salary cap is 1/10th their income? Even if everybody on the squad was on Datsyuk money they’d be at $96mm.

Where’s the money gone?

Are the U15 and up on $100k per player?

Quick google pointed me to this (brief) EY financial report for KHL:

https://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/ey-khl-report-2018/$File/ey-khl-report-2018.pdf
Компания EY подготовила отчет о деятельности КХЛ по итогам сезона 2017/2018

You can google translate the PDF (graphics become messy). League overall generated around 855m USD (53b Rubles) but the document is hard to read via google translate.

 

[ijuka]

Lev was a gimmick team, that's why it failed. As to Jokerit, so you say, 2 home games with SKA is enough to get 10k average attendance on 13.3k arena? I mean, check Jokerit average attendance figures. They are very easy to find via Google...

Jokerit average attendance, 9036 per game.

Anyway, Jokerit is a total joke and disgrace and a publicity stunt. In all effective capacity, it's owned by Russian oligarchs and it's a Russian team based in Finland, playing at a Russian arena in the Russian league. There's pretty much nothing Finnish about the team outside of the name, and without the Russian oligarch support(for political reasons), it'd have gone under ages ago, as mentioned it loses 15mil a year.

 

[Barclay Donaldson]

Lev was a gimmick team, that's why it failed. As to Jokerit, so you say, 2 home games with SKA is enough to get 10k average attendance on 13.3k arena? I mean, check Jokerit average attendance figures. They are very easy to find via Google...

Lev was two separate gimmick teams that you just tried to say were a sign that is European interest in the KHL. You just tried to make the point that they set an attendance record. Make up your mind. Either don't give in easily when I refute your assertions or don't make easily refutable assertions. And as I've already said, watch just about any non-rivalry game Jokerit played during the three year span they had good attendance on paper. The real numbers weren't even close. If you want to look into it more, look at the Jokerit 2018-19 thread. As far as we are all concerned, it's all a clear cut and closed case.

 

[SupremeNachos]

CSKA needs to get some wealthier Oligarchs.

 

[Kshahdoo]

Jokerit average attendance, 9036 per game.

Anyway, Jokerit is a total joke and disgrace and a publicity stunt. In all effective capacity, it's owned by Russian oligarchs and it's a Russian team based in Finland, playing at a Russian arena in the Russian league. There's pretty much nothing Finnish about the team outside of the name, and without the Russian oligarch support(for political reasons), it'd have gone under ages ago, as mentioned it loses 15mil a year.

Well, Jokerit has Finnish players and coach, as far as I remember, and still leads all Finnish teams in attendance. So it's hardly a joke and disgrace.

 

[MaV]

League overall generated around 855m USD (53b Rubles) but the document is hard to read via google translate.

I think the key question here is how much of that money is actually generated and how much of it is from team owners and their companies acting as sponsors? Certainly the public has money in places like Saint Petersburg, but if those are the figures, I'd still bet that most of that money is not generated from outside the teams.

 

[alko]

5 Expensive Comma Typos from History

 

[Kshahdoo]

I think the key question here is how much of that money is actually generated and how much of it is from team owners and their companies acting as sponsors? Certainly the public has money in places like Saint Petersburg, but if those are the figures, I'd still bet that most of that money is not generated from outside the teams.

Yeah, I agree, KHL isn't a business right now, and it sucks. Russian people love to get nostalgic about Soviet times, but Soviet Highest League had 12 teams. If KHL had 12 teams, it would be so much better... Alright, with hard salary cap and excluding some the poorest teams, a parity can be achieved, but the league's hockey quality will drop, because it won't be able to bring or keep better players.

On the other hand, it means more Russian players will try to make the NHL, which is good for Russian NT, the only team I actually care about.

 

[vorky]

Quick google pointed me to this (brief) EY financial report for KHL:

https://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/ey-khl-report-2018/$File/ey-khl-report-2018.pdf
Компания EY подготовила отчет о деятельности КХЛ по итогам сезона 2017/2018

You can google translate the PDF (graphics become messy). League overall generated around 855m USD (53b Rubles) but the document is hard to read via google translate.

You need to understand how the league counts it. I studied that report very closely, so I can sum it up.

53b rubles is a total budget of all clubs combined. Of all that money, 54% is sponsorship money from state corporations, 24% sponsorship agreements with commercial sponsors (non-government), 10% commercial income of clubs, 2% others, 10% funds by government (local authority)

So 5,4b rubles as commercial income. That money is sourced from tickets (48%), ads (34%), merchandising (10%) and other (8%)

Regarding SKA, you need to know how they count it. The data is provided by the Federal Tax Service of the Russian Federation.

 

[vorky]

Regarding the KHL, the league is profitable as never before.

 

[Zenos]

When the KHL launched, that's exactly what they were hoping to accomplish: a new pan-Eurasian super league. In addition to the core of Russian and ex-Soviet clubs they tried to court teams in Scandinavia and western Europe. As others have already noted, the resonance wasn't very high though. So they moved on, setting their sights on China.

Fans in Berlin, Cologne, Stockholm, Prague, Milano (for instance) just aren't particularly interested in watching their teams play in a Russian league. I'm guessing Jokerit too will eventually move back to the Finish Liiga, effectively ending the KHL's expansionist experiment.

 

[Nino33]

53b rubles is a total budget of all clubs combined. Of all that money, 54% is sponsorship money from state corporations, 24% sponsorship agreements with commercial sponsors (non-government), 10% commercial income of clubs, 2% others, 10% funds by government (local authority)

Regarding the KHL, the league is profitable as never before.

I don't see how it makes any sense to call the KHL profitable when 64% of the income is money from the government (though it does explain why people say the KHL is artificially propped up by the government)

So 5,4b rubles as commercial income. That money is sourced from tickets (48%), ads (34%), merchandising (10%) and other (8%)

34% is ads

Given "sponsorship money from state corporations" & "sponsorship agreements with commercial sponsors (non-government)" & "10% funds by government (local authority)" - who/what is advertising given government and non-government are already covered?