Tottenham Hotspur Football Club has qualified for a £175 million Covid Corporate Finance Facility. While a short-term loan, this facility was taken only after careful consideration and as a prudent safeguard. It doesn’t reflect a material change in Tottenham’s financial rating or long-term viability.

CCFF Helps Ensure Short-Term Financial Flexibility 

The Covid Corporate Finance Facility was created by the UK government as a means of ensuring short-term financial flexibility and additional working capital during this unprecedented pandemic. The funds secured through this programme are short-term commercial paper debts, and they’re specifically designed to help large firms mitigate issues caused by disruptions to their cash flows.

In order to qualify for CCFF funding, an organisation must meet certain criteria. Some of these are more general, covering basics like an organisation must not be a public undertaking and has to make a significant contribution to the United Kingdom’s economy. Other criteria are more narrowly focused, and it’s these that help show that Tottenham Hotspur remains in good overall financial position.

Specifically, every organisation that qualifies for a CCFF must have held an investment grade rating (or the equivalent thereof) on March 1, 2020. Tottenham had such a rating, which is one reason why the club qualifies, and such a rating shows that financial experts held a high view of the club’s overall financial picture before the pandemic started.

The Covid-19 Pandemic Has Disrupted Non-Football Revenues, Live Events

Being in a strong financial position on March 1 doesn’t fully insulate an organisation from the economic effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, however. Like many of Britain’s football clubs and other organisations, Tottenham has felt the economic effects of the pandemic.

In particular, the pandemic has brought significant disruption to Tottenham’s non-football revenues that are brought in by other uses of the club’s new stadium. To date, conferences, concerts, rugby and boxing events that were scheduled to take place in the stadium have been cancelled. Obviously, such cancellations of major events like these create unwanted — although not insurmountable — losses in revenue.

The CCFF funding was secured in order to mitigate the effects that these losses in revenue might have. The funding was secured on advice from HSBC, which is already a financial partner through the bank’s funding of the club’s new stadium.

Tottenham Hotspur FC Continues To Be Well-Positioned for the Long-Term Future

While facing short-term obstacles as every organisation is during this time, Tottenham FC remains well-positioned for success both on the pitch and off the pitch once football resumes play.

The club has the longest-tenured chairman of any Premier League club in Daniel Levy, who has been with Tottenham for 19 years and taken the club from mid-level to top-tier. 

With regard to finances, the £175 million facility will help ensure the club can navigate its short-term disruptions without placing the club in long-term peril. Even with the stadium funding that was already in place, this continues to be a manageable debt load. Tottenham follows a strict profit and loss model that’s shown solid profits in recent years, and the debts are all short-term commercial paper loans with staggered durations of 10 to 30 years. 

Additionally, Tottenham has become a worldwide sports and entertainment brand that’s able to cope with these stresses. Already, the club has made moves to increase income from other revenue streams because of the changes that the pandemic has brought about. 

While the pandemic is affecting clubs’ finances in different ways, many clubs will be forced to pursue alternative revenue streams. In this, Tottenham has been and will continue to be a stand-out organisation. There’s a reason why the club has a 10-year contract with the United States’ National Football League to host two games annually at the stadium.

Spurs Continues to Care for the Community

In the midst of all of this, Tottenham Hotspur FC continues to care for and assist the community wherever possible. Currently, the new stadium is being used as a COVID-19 Testing site, a food distribution hub, and temporary home to a maternity outpatient unit from a local hospital. 

This remains an unprecedented time for all, but Spurs looks forward to when players return to the pitch and non-football events resume. These funds will help until that time, and the club expects to see continued success when that time does come.