German Professional Sports Leagues Generate Record Revenue Of $528M

The Basketball Bundesliga (BBL), the German Hockey League (DEL), the Handball Bundesliga (HBL) and football's 3rd League generated a combined revenue of €384M ($528M) during the '12-13 fiscal year. The sixth "Finanzreport deutscher Profisportligen" (Financial Report of German Professional Sports Leagues) conducted by Deloitte in collaboration with the Koblenz University of Applied Sciences showed that the leagues were able to increase last year's revenue record of €350.1M by another 10%. The major drivers of the increase were the 3rd League and the BBL, which each experienced double-digit growth with 21% and 13% increases, respectively. The DEL remained in second with a revenue of €91.9M (+7%), only trailing the 3rd League, which generated a revenue of €121.9M. For the first time, the BBL, which had a total revenue of €86.6M, passed the HBL and its revenue of €83.6M. The HBL was the only one of the four leagues whose revenue decreased (-3%) in comparison to the previous season. At the same time, the HBL generated a profit of €3.1M, which was the league's best result since '02-03, and the highest profit of all four leagues during the '12-13 fiscal year (Deloitte).