Juventus shares soar 19% after Agnelli family rejects crypto firm Tether's bid

By Giulio Piovaccari ‌and Valentina Za

Dec 15 (Reuters) - Shares in Juventus surged almost 19% on Monday, after Italy's Agnelli family on Saturday rejected ‍crypto group ‌Tether's surprise offer that valued the Serie A soccer club at 1.1 billion euros ($1.29 billion).

That compares with a 1.3 billion euro ⁠equity valuation for the club based on Football Benchmark's 2025 ‌Valuation Report, fuelling speculation of a possible improved bid.

Tether did not reply to Reuters requests for comment.

With 36 Serie A titles to their name, Juventus are Italy's most successful soccer club, but they have faltered since clinching a ninth straight championship in 2020 and now sits fifth in the table.

Shares in ⁠Juventus have lost 57% of their value over the past five years, LSEG data showed.

Once home to stars such as Michel Platini, Roberto Baggio, Alessandro Del Piero ​and Cristiano Ronaldo, ownership of Juventus helped the Agnellis, the family that created carmaker ‌Fiat, to build consensus and popularity in Italy.

The bid ⁠from Tether, issuer of the world's most widely used USDT stablecoin, comes at a fraught time for the Agnellis.

The family, often dubbed Italy's royals, has entered talks to sell GEDI, publisher of La Repubblica and La Stampa newspapers, sparking strikes and concerns ​about jobs.

Meanwhile, troubles at their main asset, auto company Stellantis strained relations with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, prompting the automaker a year ago to announce an investment plan to increase production in Italy.

TETHER PROMISES INVESTMENT IN CLUB

With a 21% premium to Friday's closing price, Tether's bid lifted the stock to its highest level since mid-November, even as the family's holding company Exor said it had ​no intention ‍of selling any of its shares in ​the Turin-based club.

Run by Italian Paolo Ardoino, a Juventus supporter, Tether has built a stake of over 10% in the club.

In its statement late on Friday, El Salvador-based Tether said it was prepared to invest up to 1 billion euros to support Juventus' sporting and commercial development.

UEFA, European soccer's governing body, caps the amount clubs can spend on player transfers and wages as a proportion of their revenue, making it harder for new owners to spend very large sums to pursue a rapid improvement on the field.

Juventus accounted for around 2% ⁠of Exor's net asset value at Friday's market prices, analyst Martino De Ambroggi from Equita said, noting a sale would have cut Exor's net debt by some 650 million euros to around ​1.6 billion euros.

Such a disposal would have also "marked the exit from an asset whose capital increases over the past six years have absorbed around 600 million euros", De Ambroggi added.

Tether's USDT stablecoin dominates the U.S. dollar–referenced stablecoin market, accounting for around 56% of the total, according to the Bank of Italy. 

Stablecoins — digital assets pegged one-to-one to traditional currencies ‌mostly used by crypto traders — have gained a market value of nearly $300 billion in a decade, with U.S. dollar–linked tokens accounting for 98% of that value.

($1 = 0.8508 euros)

(Additional reporting by Laura Contemori in Gdansk; Editing by Amanda Cooper, Milla Nissi-Prussak, Keith Weir and Ken Ferris)