£12m Arsenal agreement laid bare as Stan Kroenke signs two new deals in the US

Arsenal owner and co-chair Stan Kroenke has just lost a trusted lieutenant in Edu Gaspar but the demands of his £12bn sports empire means he cannot afford to ruminate on the setback for long.

Stan Kroenke has earned the moniker Silent Stan due to his laissez-faire approach to public appearances at Arsenal and across his wider investment portfolio, which encompasses nine sports teams in total.

Josh Kroenke, Stan’s son and business partner, now appears to have been give the license to act as the public face of Arsenal.

It was Josh, for example, who revealed in the summer that Arsenal are exploring expanding the Emirates Stadium after nearly two decades at the ground in a project that could cost up to £500m.

But the biggest decisions at Arsenal are still Kroenke senior’s, just as they are throughout the Kroenke Sports & Entertainment network.

Stan Kroenke-owned franchises

• Arsenal – Premier League (London)
• Los Angeles Rams – NFL (California)
• Denver Nuggets – NBA (Colorado)
• Colorado Avalanche – NHL (Colorado)
• Colorado Rapids – MLS (Colorado)
• Colorado Mammoth – National Lacrosse League (Colorado)
• Los Angeles Gladiators & Guerrillas – esports (California

The fact that Arsenal have loosened the purse strings somewhat in recent years will also have come from the 76-year-old Missouri-born billionaire.

Historically, Kroenke has not been keen to underwrite year-on-year losses in North London to fund lavish transfers, but Arsenal’s amortisation bill of £139m in the last financial year is evidence of a gear shift.

But the Kroenkes have always been explicit about wanting their Premier League club to stand on its own two feet financially in the long term, just as their NFL, NBA and NHL franchises in the US do.

And the latest news from elsewhere in the Kroenke sports empire reveals something interesting about the Gunners’ financial strategy.

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Stan Kroenke brings in new sponsors, but Arsenal left out

Arsenal’s commercial income in 2022-23, the last financial year on record, totalled £173m.

A respectable sum in isolation, but their revenue from sponsorship, merchandise and events is the quite comfortably the lowest in the so-called Big Six.

To combat this, Arsenal’s chief commercial officer Juliet Slot has been attempting to improve the depth of the club’s sponsorship inventory.

Last year, they struck a £3m-a-year deal with Betway which will be worth at least £12m over its lifetime.

That partnership explains why Arsenal have been excluded from the package agreement with Bet365 that has seen Kroenke-owned Denver Nuggets (NBA) and Colorado Rapids (NHL) sign deals with the British firm.

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Arsenal’s commercial income: Key to Mikel Arteta’s budget

Events in Colorado might seem far removed from Arsenal and the budget entrusted to Mikel Arteta, but the reality is that the operations in the KSE network are all interwoven.

Kroenke is one of only a handful of owners whose teams feature more than once in the top 50 most valuable franchises in world sport.

He has reached that position partly by creating synergies and sharing resources between the teams he owns.

Arsenal are not among the clubs who are struggling with PSR, but commercial income is central to maintaining that position and bolstering th playing budget.