Cristiano Ronaldo reportedly charged £920,000 for four-and-a-half hours of his time a few years back, according to the Football Leaks book.
The Manchester United icon is known to have many different avenues for accumulating wealth, alongside the £69 million annual salary paid by his club Al-Nassr. As well his new and highly lucrative ‘UR Cristiano’ YouTube channel, the five-time Ballon d’Or winner makes money through various endorsement deals and businesses.
It’ll be no surprise to anyone that hiring Ronaldo for media duties is costly and, per Football Leaks, the player’s representatives asked for £920,000 from Mobily, a Saudi telecoms business, to do a commercial deal with Ronaldo’s Irish image rights company, Multisports & Image Management. The deal included a photo shoot, five signed Portugal shirts and two plugs across his social media channels.
Ronaldo Charged £920k For Four Hours of his Time
He’s the most followed person on the planet
Boasting a staggering 641 million followers on Instagram, more than anyone on the planet, and a hefty 65 million YouTube subscribers, Ronaldo is arguably the most recognisable figure in the world. As a result, the money the striker is able to extract from various companies looking to use his fame to their commercial advantage is mouth-watering.
Providing an insight into just how extortionate renting Ronaldo’s services for a short period is, Football Leaks –a 2018 book written by Der Spiegel journalists Rafael Buschmann and Michael Wulzinger – presented one example of the maverick’s commercial dealings. The German journalists uncovered the details of a deal between Ronaldo’s company, Multisports & Image Management and Mobily, a Saudi telecoms business, that ensued years before the former Manchester United man made the switch to Al-Nassr.
The Saudi firm received four-and-a-half hours of Ronaldo’s time, which included a photo shoot, five signed Portugal shirts and two advertisements of their company across his various extremely well-followed social media platforms. In exchange, Ronaldo received £920,000.
Mobily had permission to use all the images taken throughout the session, but were limited to advertising exclusively to the Middle East and North Africa.
This £920,000 figure works out at around £204,000 per hour, £3,407 a minute and £56.78 a second. Given this deal was a few years ago, it’s not unreasonable to assume that this figure would be significantly higher in the present day.