The Serie An enormous has been accused of falsifying its monetary affairs
The complete board of administrators at Serie A giants Juventus, together with membership president Andrea Agnelli, has resigned with rapid impact amid an ongoing investigation by prosecutors and monetary regulators into allegations of false accounting and market manipulation.
The membership and its house owners have denied any wrongdoing.
Agnelli and the membership’s vp Pavel Nedved, the Czech footballer who represented Juventus between 2001 and 2009, are amongst these presently below investigation after Juventus posted a lack of greater than $ 263 million (£220 million) for final season, the best such monetary loss within the membership’s historical past.
“The Board of Administrators, contemplating the main focus and relevance of the pending authorized and technical-accounting points, have deemed it in the very best curiosity to advocate that Juventus undertake a brand new Board of Administrators to take care of these points,” the membership introduced in a press release.
Information of the cull within the Juve boardroom led to a 5% drop within the membership’s market value when buying and selling opened on Tuesday morning and has left the Italian giants with its lowest valuation in 5 years.
Andrea Agnelli is a descendant of Giovanni Agnelli, one of many founders of Fiat which might go on to change into the most important producer of vehicles in Italy, and he has been in command of the membership since 2010.
He was one of many principal figures behind final yr’s ill-fated European Tremendous League proposal – with Juventus, together with Actual Madrid and Barcelona, nonetheless remaining hooked up to the undertaking regardless of a number of different giant European soccer golf equipment withdrawing because of excessive fan backlash.
Beneath Andrea Agnelli’s stewardship, Juventus dominated Italian soccer and gained 9 league titles in succession till their run ended within the 2019-20 marketing campaign.
It was additionally confirmed on Tuesday that Turin-born Gianluca Ferrero will substitute Agnelli at Juve, with the membership including in a press release that he “has strong expertise and the required technical abilities, in addition to a real ardour for Juventus, which make him probably the most appropriate particular person to carry the place.”
It stays to be seen what motion – if any – will probably be taken towards the membership whether it is discovered to have damaged monetary guidelines.
Juventus had beforehand been concerned in a separate scandal following the 2005-06 season, during which the membership was discovered to have acted improperly by petitioning to have favorable referees officiate their matches. They had been subsequently stripped of a Serie A title and relegated to the second tier of Italian soccer as punishment.