FIFA Bans Third-Party Ownership of Players
The Federation on International Football Associations, FIFA, has agreed to ban the third-party ownership (TPO) of players, in which investment companies have a stake in the economic rights of players.
TPO requires clubs interested in buying players involved in the ownership to buy out the contract rights from all parties retaining a financial interest. Although TPO is already banned in Britain, FIFA president Sepp Blatter said it will take a “transitional period” before the ban comes into effect in Europe and South America, also saying it threatens the integrity of the sport and creates conflicts of interest.
FIFA secretary general, Jerome Valcke also said the federation set up a group to implement the ban and would determine how long the transitional period would be before the next FIFA executive committee meeting in December.
“The ban cannot be implemented immediately and we are discussing the number of transfer windows we have to wait for this ban to come in,” Valcke said.
“It’s a matter of whether we are talking about six transfer windows, meaning three years, or eight, meaning four years, this is what we will be discussing in this working group.”
