How Much is Leo Messi Earning at Barcelona?

By: Daryl | September 18th, 2009

Big news on the official Barcelona website today is that Leo Messi has signed a new, improved contract with the Blaugrana. They even have a photo of him putting pen to paper (which I’ve stolen and embedded to your left) so it must be true.

Young Leo (he’s still only 22) already had a contract with Barca that ran until 2014, with a €150m release clause. But the new deal keeps him at the Camp Nou until 2016, and has a minimum fee release clause of €250m.

All, well and good but what I really want to know is: How much are Barcelona paying Leo Messi?

The size of young Lionel’s salary (he’s still only 22 by the way) isn’t mentioned in the official Barcelona story. Deliberately I presume, as news on exactly how much he earns is surprisingly hard to come by.

That hasn’t stopped people guessing though.

The Guardian report that the Spanish media report that Messi will now take home €10.5m per year after tax. Divide that by 52 and apparently Leo Messi is earning just over €200,000 per week. After tax.

According to Wikipedia, the top income tax bracket in Spain is 42%. But I’m pretty sure that the tax rate also varies by province, so that may not be 100% accurate. But if it was, then that would put Messi’s pre-tax earnings at a staggering €18.1 a year, or €348,000 per week.

But of course, we don’t know any of this for sure. Question is: If you were in charge of the Barcelona budget, how much would you pay Leo Messi per week?

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Category: Spain La Liga

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Daryl

Yeah, the special 25% tax rate is available to foreigners during their first six years in Spain. So that definitely rules Messi out.
Vinod

Lord Quas, that's only foreign players (and workers, presumably). I'm not sure if Messi counts as a foreign player anymore, I think he has a Spanish passport - since he's been there since he was a little kid.
vishnu

i read somewhere that Messi senior had agreed with Barca officials to put a clause in his contract to ensure that Leo is always the highest paid player in the barca squad. So i'd imagine that this new contract is simply adding 5000 euros a week on top of Zlatan's salary.
Lord Quas

football players only pay 23%
Omar

HE IS A "GOOD" PLAYER, HASN'T DONE CRAP FOR THE NATIONAL TEAM THOUGH
MoMONEY

Deserves every penny. The kid is a phenomenon. We will be mentioning him with the all time greats in 10 years time...
MoMONEY

Deserves every penny. The kid is a pheomenon. We will be mwntioning him with the all time greats in 10 years time...
Alexis

His father is his agent, so he was playing his role. What I would like to know is until when. Until when Mr. Messi will try to fill his son's pockets with 500 Euro notes. Money coming from the only club that paid for his growth treatment. Money from the club that has made him what he is today. Because all of them: from Stoichkov to Figo, from Maradona to Laudrup, from Romario to Ronaldo achieved their status at Barcelona.
As a culé, I would love him to retire in "blaugrana". But if the club feels the need to improve his wages (this is the fifth time in 4 years) due to Mr. Messi's comments, bring on the Manchester City money whenever he runs out of contract at 28-29...
Superlen

Messi's father never said that you clown. Messi's been saying for years that he wants to stay at the mighty Barca for the rest of his career. It's great news for Barca and for Spanish football in general yet again proving that all the top players want to play in Spain mainly the mighty Barca and the ones we don't want go to england and try to prove their good enough for us and if they are then we take them.
Tim

You pay him what it costs. I'm pretty sure Barca can afford this amount, staggering as it is. Must be fun to be Leo Messi, huh?