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Barcelona to register new signings for upcoming season after €100m injection

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Barcelona president Joan Laporta said the club have sold 24.5% of Barca Studios to Socios.com for €100 million to help register new signings.

Barca have spent over €150m on Raphinha, Robert Lewandowski and Jules Kounde this summer, while Andreas Christensen and Franck Kessie have both arrived on free transfers.

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Following Laporta's quotes, the club released a statement on Monday which read: "FC Barcelona announces the sale of 24.5% of Barça Studios to the company Socios.com for €100m to accelerate the club's audiovisual, blockchain, NFT and Web.3 strategy.

"The sale has been made in accordance with the authorisation of the general assembly of FC Barcelona members held last Oct. 23."

However, due to strict spending caps in LaLiga, the Blaugrana have so far been unable to register the new arrivals with the Spanish league.

Having already sold 25% of their domestic television rights to investment fund Sixth Street for around €600m, Barca hope the deal with Socios.com will further ease their financial problems.

"We're doing our homework to be able to register players," Laporta said after announcing the agreement Monday at the presentation of Kounde, a €55m signing from Sevilla.

"We have done these financial operations to save the club and to sign new players. I hope we don't have to do anymore.

"It is a controlled risk. If we have to recover the plan of [selling further club assets], we will weigh it up, but we believe we can register the new signings with this deal."

Barca Studios is a subsidiary of the Catalan club that produces in-house and external television content, along with other productions.

Laporta said Socios.com can also help with expansion into the metaverse and with non-fungible tokens. Barca last week sold their first NFT for over $600,000 at an auction in New York.

Along with registering their new signings, Laporta said Barca are also now prioritising the departures of players who do not feature in coach Xavi Hernandez's plans.

Following Oscar Mingueza's move to Celta Vigo, the club are working on finding solutions for Neto, Riqui Puig, Samuel Umtiti and Martin Braithwaite, who were all left out of the squad for the tour of the United States, while they will also listen to offers for Miralem Pjanic, Sergino Dest, Memphis Depay and Frenkie de Jong, among others.

Laporta hopes that will allow the club to make further signings before the transfer window closes, with the president refusing to rule out a late move for Bernardo Silva.

"First we have to register the players we have signed and resolve the futures of the players not in the manager's plans," Laporta said when asked about the Manchester City midfielder.

"After that, we will see what we can do. The coach wants more reinforcements."

Barca's spending and the sale of stakes in television rights and Barca Studios comes just a year after they were unable to afford to keep Lionel Messi, while the club's gross debt still stands at over €1 billion.

However, the vending of assets this summer has allowed them to turn to the transfer market, with Kounde becoming their latest signing last week.

Kounde, 23, was also the subject of interest from Premier League side Chelsea, but he said a move to Camp Nou was always his first choice.

"I had another opportunity [Chelsea] but I made an effort in the sense of waiting for Barca to reach an agreement with Sevilla, which was possible in the end," the France international said at his presentation on Monday.

"From there, I chose Barca. I was very clear about what I wanted. They are an ambitious club, I like the Spanish league a lot ... so that was the effort I made, although it was not that much of an effort because I wanted to be here."