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IOC posts $55m deficit with revenue from Tokyo 2020

Postponement of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics has, as expected, taken a heavy toll on the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) financial performance in 2020, with the Lausanne-based body reporting a deficit of $55 million (£40 million/€46.7 million) for the year.

Whereas the IOC might have expected 2020 revenue, absent the pandemic, of not far short of $4 billion (£2.9 billion/€3.4 billion) – it managed $3.52 billion (£2.6 billion/€3 billion) in the last Summer Games year of 2016 – the actual figure, according to newly-published accounts, is $623.8 million (£454 million/€530 million).

The big absence is Tokyo 2020 broadcasting-rights income, which instead now looks set to be taken in the current financial year, once the Games have been duly delivered and consumed by their global audience.

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In 2016, TV rights contributed $2.87 billion (£2.1 billion/€2.4 billion) to revenue; in 2020, they chipped in only just over $1 million (£730,000/€850,000).

The vast bulk of income in the latest period came from marketing rights paid by multinational companies for participation in the IOC’s The Olympic Programme (TOP) worldwide sponsorship scheme.

The $532.4 million (£387.6 million/€452 million) of revenue this provided in 2020, means that by my calculations TOP has now generated not far off $2.2 billion (£1.6 billion/€1.9 billion) – though by no means all in cash – for the IOC over the Pyeongchang 2018-Tokyo 2020 cycle.

This means that, in spite of coronavirus, the IOC has hit the $2 billion (£1.5 billion/€1.7 billion) target first revealed by insidethegames six years ago.

It was only in the 2013-2016 quadrennium that TOP for the first time contributed more than $1 billion (£730 million/€850 million) in cash and value-in-kind to the Movement.

Expenditures in 2020 totalled just under $800 million (£582 million/€679 million).

Some $300 million (£218 million/€255 million) of the TOP-derived income was distributed to various Games Organising Committees and National Olympic Committees (NOCs).

The share of the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) was put at $88.7 million (£64.6 million/€75.3 million).

This was marginally below the $89.8 million (£65.4 million/€76.2 million) paid in total to other NOCs.

As in 2019, the IOC was helped by a big chunk of financial income – $119.9 million (£87.3 million/€101.8 million) in 2020, down from $159.6 million (£116.2 million/€135.5 million) the previous year.

A breakdown indicated that $52.1 million (£37.9 million/€44.2 million) of this came from interest and dividend income.

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