The Barça's balancing acts to avoid the halt of the Camp Nou works

BarcelonaIt has been more than a month since Camp Nou has been operating with the first two stands full. After uncomfortable tug-of-wars with technicians from the Barcelona City Council, Barça was able to implement phase 1C of the stadium's reopening to aim to accommodate a maximum of 62,000 people inside. The current season will end with this capacity, despite considerable progress in the construction of the third stand, which will house more than 40,000 spectators, reaching a capacity of 105,000.

The third tier is already a reality, but it will still take quite some time before it can start generating revenue. Before that, its surface will need to be waterproofed, seats for the general public will need to be installed, and up to two floors of VIP boxes will need to be prepared, which is one of the main differences of the new venue compared to the old one. In parallel, permits will have to be managed so that this entire sector, which has been built from scratch, can accommodate the planned capacity. In the same way as has been done with the rest of the stadium, there is a phased reopening schedule, with priority for the side and the grandstand, which will be consumed as the next fiscal year progresses. Once this process is completed, the installation of the roof will remain pending, which will require a second exile at the Johan Cruyff Stadium or Montjuïc.

Beyond deadlines that, with precedents in hand, will tend to lengthen, the focus must be placed on the money Limak will have available to finish the works. Will the operation that the partners validated in a referendum in December 2021 be enough? According to data available from the National Securities Market Commission (CNMV), the total structured financing of the securitization fund linked to the comprehensive renovation of the new Camp Nou and its surroundings amounts to 1,377 million euros, excluding financial costs. Of this amount, by the end of last year, 1,009 million had already been injected, which represents 73% of the total. The expenditure during 2025, a year in which the culé stadium was closed for works until the end of November, was 388 million, about 32 per month. At this rate of disbursement, the latest CNMV update indicates that the fund will be exhausted by the end of May 2026.

More than 1,000 million with the stadium halfway done

Contrary to this pessimistic forecast, sources at Barça assure that the tap will still pour credit from this date onwards, but they do not argue whether there will be enough to complete the third tier and the roof. What they do admit is that the more than 1,000 million spent from the securitization fund do not solely correspond to the Camp Nou works. Of this amount, more than 700 million are attributed exclusively to the stadium's renovation, but there are other items that have also drawn from the same source, such as the urbanization of Menéndez Pelayo street and Joan XXIII avenue, as well as the works of the new ice rink on land belonging to the University of Barcelona (UB). There is no trace of the Palau Blaugrana in this list of needs met with money provided by Espai Barça investors through Goldman Sachs. The new arena for the sections, which does not yet have a consolidated project, will have to have separate financing.

in an interview with ARA before the elections.To solve some of these imponderables, and since Goldman Sachs does not release capital gladly, Barça has had to put money from its ordinary budget to prevent the work from stopping, as Ferran Olivé admitted in an interview with ARA before the elections. "We will have to negotiate with Limak [...]. Many things have happened. There will be money that Limak will have to return to us," stated the future (pending official confirmation) economic vice-president of the blaugrana in this regard. Therefore, the balances with the Turkish construction company and with the investors are set, with the real threat of a credit extension on the horizon. With less than 300 million available in the securitization fund, unforeseen expenses paid with the entity's ordinary budget, and the stadium half-reformed, questions are accumulating at a particularly critical moment for the work. Part of the answers will come with the audited accounts for the current year and with the next CNMV update.