Several clubs had already used it individually in the course of April. The Professional Football League (LFP) announced on Monday May 4 that it had also ratified the subscription of a loan guaranteed by the French State, estimated by several sources at 225 million euros, to compensate for the shortfall in TV rights after the final stop of the championship because of the coronavirus.

Meeting in a general assembly in the afternoon, the 40 Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 clubs "adopted a resolution allowing the LFP to contract with its banking establishment a loan guaranteed by the State (PGE)", a announced the LFP in a press release.

The amount of this loan, which corresponds to the television rights not paid due to the cessation of the championship, is 224.5 million euros, we learned from a source close to the file, confirming the figures advanced by the L'Équipe daily newspaper.

A government guaranteed loan

"Thanks to this loan, the LFP will be able to pay the Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 clubs all of the sums still to be collected for audiovisual rights for the 2019-2020 season," said the LFP.

With the final cessation of the championship, pronounced Thursday, April 30, all the television rights payments expected by the end of the season will not indeed land in the coffers of clubs, deprived of matches for at least four months from here at the end of July.

The State Guaranteed Loan System (PGE), put in place at the end of March by the government, allows companies in difficulty due to the Covid-19 epidemic to take out a loan with the guarantee that in case of no - reimbursement, the State will assume the major part of the rest of the credit to be reimbursed. It has committed to guarantee up to 300 billion euros in loans.

Several clubs, which have also applied the partial activity mechanism since the start of the crisis, have already taken out individually guaranteed loans.

With AFP

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