The Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) has lost about $55 million if its finances are converted to dollars.
In early 2025, the value of the U.S. dollar fell by about 9% against other major currencies, a development economists linked to declining investor confidence in the U.S. economy following President Donald Trump’s return to office.
UEFA revealed this in its 52-page annual financial report, citing “economic, market and geopolitical dynamics” and a “sudden weakening of the U.S. dollar” for driving the foreign exchange losses, which accounted for the loss in its accounts for the 2024-25 football season.
“In the past few years, UEFA benefited from a strong U.S. dollar, leading to substantial gains on foreign exchange. In March 2025, however, the tides turned, and the U.S. dollar rapidly weakened by almost 9%, resulting in currency exchange losses of €47 million.”
According to reports, the loss UEFA recorded is valued at about $54.5 million using Thursday’s exchange rate, an equivalent of the federation’s total loss for the year, which was €46.2 million, which was sorted with money from their reserves.
Because of losses linked to the U.S. dollar, UEFA’s reserves dropped to €521.8 million by the end of June. This is only slightly above the €500 million minimum UEFA wants to keep so it can continue funding its 55 member associations and organise national team competitions at all levels, from youth to senior teams.
Despite UEFA organising several tournaments, including the Champions League, which rakes in billions every campaign, a huge chunk of the revenue is paid to the clubs as prize money, leading to little to no profits generated for Switzerland based organisation.
The four-yearly men’s European Championship, which earned about €2.5 billion for the 2024 edition in Germany, fuels UEFA’s reserves and the main funding program known as “HatTrick”, which pays members double what they get annually from FIFA.
UEFA said in the financial report it “needs to hold a big U.S. dollar position to back outstanding hedge transactions,” and so when the value started falling a year ago “, substantial losses were inevitable.”
“The foreign exchange result had been consistently positive for several years, but this unfortunately changed in spring 2025 when the U.S. dollar suddenly weakened for various reasons, including economic, market and geopolitical dynamics,” the UEFA document said.
UEFA acknowledged a “disappointing” outcome for its asset management last year compared to a “very exceptional 2023-24,” which was the last full financial year during the previous U.S. administration.
In a separate development, A global statement shared by FIFA suggests that half a million requests for tickets have been made from across the world for tickets for the upcoming World Cup in June.
The statement shared on the football governing body on Wednesday, January 14, mentioned that, “more than half a billion ticket requests submitted during the Random Selection Draw ticket sales phase, which ran from Thursday, 11 December 2025 to Tuesday, 13 January 2026.
FIFA said it received approximately 15 million ticket requests daily over the about a month application window, marking a new record in the history of football.
“With each application validated by unique credit card data, fans placed an average of 15 million ticket requests per day over the 33-day application window, setting a new benchmark for demand in the history of world sport”, parts of the statement said.
Out of the over 500 million ticket requests, the majority came from Germany, England, Brazil, Spain, Portugal, Argentina and Colombia, aside from the host countries; USA, Mexico and Canada.
It added that, “The most coveted match in this sales phase was Colombia v. Portugal on Saturday, 27 June in Miami. The top 5 was completed by Mexico v. Korea Republic in Guadalajara on Thursday, 18 June; the final in New York New Jersey on Sunday, 19 July; the tournament’s opening match between Mexico and South Africa in Mexico City on Thursday, 11 June; and the round-of-32 match in Toronto on Thursday, 2 July – highlighting the exceptional appeal of both marquee fixtures and knockout-stage encounters across all three host nations”.
Given the outstanding requests, FIFA President Gianni Infantino expressed his excitement and gratitude to fans all over the world for the massive response.
“Half a billion ticket requests in just over a month is more than demand – it’s a global statement. On behalf of FIFA, I would like to thank and congratulate football fans everywhere for this extraordinary response,” said FIFA President Gianni Infantino.
He continued, “Knowing how much this tournament means to people around the world, our only regret is that we cannot welcome every fan inside the stadiums. That is why we are committed to creating multiple ways for fans to be part of the FIFA World Cup 2026, through a wide range of fan experiences beyond the stadiums, both in person and online, so that as many people as possible can share in what will be the biggest sporting event ever staged.”
