Serie A has closed the 2026 summer transfer window with 1.16 billion euros spent, second in Europe ahead of the Bundesliga, La Liga and Ligue 1. A figure that makes you think of a championship that has returned to being rich. But just look at what happened in the Premier League: English clubs have spent 4.1 billion euros, more than the other four major European championships have spent combined.
The difference does not depend on the number of operations. In the overall data of Transfermarkt, Serie A counts 752 incoming movements against 367 in England, but if we remove loans and transfers within the championships, the comparison changes: 109 Italian operations against 124 in the Premier League, while the expenses remain around 1.08 and 3.7 billion euros. With almost the same number of movements, the average English value is about three times.
Why the Premier League could spend four times more than Serie A
The explanation starts from the structural wealth of the English championship. Deloitte has calculated 6.8 billion pounds of aggregated revenue in the 2024/25 season, against around 3 billion euros for Serie A. For the Premier League, the forecast is also to exceed 7 billion pounds in the 2025/26 season, also thanks to the new cycle of audiovisual rights. Added to this base is a domestic market that continues to feed itself: 38% of the deals last season took place between clubs from the same Premier League.
The mechanism is clear: a sale immediately produces a capital gain, while the cost of the purchase is amortized over the years. With the new Squad Cost Ratio, these capital gains can also increase the regulatory space for new spending. A circuit that supports ever higher valuations while staying, in most cases, within the rules.
Fernandez, Rogers and Barcola: the English transfer market is on another level
The summer transfers show the disparity. Manchester City paid around £125m for Enzo Fernandez and £116m for Elliot Anderson; Chelsea £117m for Morgan Rogers, Liverpool over £100m for Bradley Barcola and Tottenham up to £100m for Sandro Tonali. Four of the eleven most expensive signings in Premier League history have come in the same summer.
Elsewhere the figures are different: Milan have invested 74 million euros plus bonuses for Gonçalo Ramos, Dortmund around 38 for Karetsas, while Sporting 30 for Zalazar. And the balance makes the point clear: the Premier League has closed with a negative balance of around 1.6 billion euros, compared to 423 million euros for Serie A.
Serie A is back to spending: comparison with the last 6 transfer windows
Serie A's second place is not just an effect of the 2026 session. In the last six summer transfer windows, Italian clubs have recovered ground compared to the period immediately after the pandemic: from around 623 million euros in 2021, to 749 million in 2022, to nearly 900 million in 2023 and passing one billion in the last two summers.
In 2025, spending had reached 1.19 billion euros, while in 2026 it stopped at 1.16. In both sessions, Italy was significantly ahead of the Bundesliga, La Liga and Ligue 1. The growth of Serie A compared to its continental rivals is therefore real. But in the same period, the Premier League has further increased its economic capacity. The Italian second place exists: but between being second and competing economically with the Premier League there is a chasm.
