Facts about the amounts of money in sport, and recent corruption scandals
LONDON (TrustLaw) – The potential rewards for those willing to act corruptly in sport are on the increase as money from television and sponsorships rights floods in to the industry.
Betting, both legal and illegal, has contributed to a rise in match-fixing allegations. Match-fixing is thought to net betting syndicates millions of dollars.
Below are some facts about the amounts of money in sport, and recent corruption scandals:
HOW BIG IS THE INTERNATIONAL SPORTS INDUSTRY?
- In the European Union (EU), the sporting industry is estimated to account for up to 3.65 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).
- The International Olympic Committee (IOC) earned approximately $1.7 billion from the television rights for the Beijing Summer Olympic Games in 2008. The IOC also earned approximately $1.2 billion from sponsorship rights for the Beijing games.
- Jerome Valcke, the general secretary of football’s governing body FIFA, said that he expects the 2014 World Cup to generate profits of $1.2 billion for FIFA, almost double the figure achieved by the 2010 tournament in South Africa.
MATCH-FIXING
- Match-fixing is often driven by the legal and illegal betting markets. Betting organisations estimate that the legal sports betting market is worth roughly $400 billion and the illegal market is worth about $200 billion.
- Pakistan cricketers Salman Butt and Mohammad Asif were found guilty in November 2011 of taking bribes to fix part of a test match against England.
- In June 2011, Italy’s Interior Ministry set up a special match-fixing task force in response to a number of high profile cases.
DOPING
- American cyclist Lance Armstrong was stripped of his record seven Tour de France wins in October and handed a lifetime ban by the United States Anti-Doping Agency on charges he had used performance-enhancing drugs throughout his career. He denied he ever used performance-enhancing drugs.
- Despite very tight controls to prevent cheating, around a dozen athletes were excluded from this year's London Olympics after testing positive for doping.
BRIBERY SCANDALS
A number of bribery scandals concerning FIFA have arisen in the last two years including: The alleged buying of votes in the 2011 FIFA presidential elections, news of bribe-taking by former senior FIFA members on World Cup deals in the 1990s, and allegations that Qatar bought the right to stage the 2022 World Cup. Qatar issued a flat denial of any wrongdoing.
- Several members of FIFA's executive committee have been subject to allegations of corruption in the last two years.
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