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Author: Sleepy.txt
Tether, the world’s largest stablecoin giant, is preparing to buy Juventus, Italy’s most iconic football club.
On December 12, Tether submitted a takeover offer to the Italian Stock Exchange, hoping to acquire the 65.4% stake in Juventus held by the Exor Group at a price of 2.66 euros per share, which is 20.74% higher than the market price.If the deal goes through, Tether will also inject an additional €1 billion into the club.
This is an all-cash offer.There is no betting, no additional conditions, just “pay one hand and deliver the goods with the other hand.”In the world of capital, this is the crudest form of sincerity, and Tether left the Exor Group with only 10 days to think about it.
However, Exor Group, controlled by the Agnelli family, quickly issued a statement: “There are currently no negotiations to sell shares in Juventus.”
The implication is clear: not for sale.
In less than 24 hours, well-known Italian journalist Eleonora Trotta revealed in a report: Tether is prepared to double the offer, directly raising Juventus’ valuation to 2 billion euros.
The man standing in the eye of the storm is Paolo Ardoino.
Paolo was born in an ordinary town in Italy in 1984.His parents are civil servants, and his grandparents guard a traditional olive grove.It was a typical Italian childhood. The black and white striped jersey, the shouts of Turin’s Allianz Stadium, and the glory of the Agnelli family all together constituted the spiritual totem in his memory of growing up.
32 years later, the boy under the olive tree grew up to be the Caesar of the cryptocurrency world, in charge of Tether, a super money-printing machine with annual profits of US$13 billion.Now he returns home in fine clothes, trying to buy his childhood dream and give back to the black and white faith flowing in his blood.
But reality teaches feelings a lesson.
When Paolo knocked on the door of Juventus with enthusiasm, he was greeted with no flowers and no applause.What awaited him was nine months of ostracism and humiliation from the old world.
9 months of being ostracized
The honeymoon phase begins with an almost unrequited love.
In February 2025, Tether announced that it had acquired 8.2% of Juventus’ shares, becoming the second largest shareholder after the Exor Group.In the official statement, Paolo abandoned the shrewdness of businessmen and showed a rare softness: “For me, Juventus has always been a part of my life.”
Paolo thought it was a give-and-take business: I had money, you lacked it, and we hit it off.However, in Italy, there are some doors that money cannot knock on.
Two months later, Juventus announced a capital increase of up to €110 million.At this critical moment when blood transfusion was urgently needed, Paolo, as the second largest shareholder, was deliberately “forgotten”.No phone calls, no emails, no explanation.The Exor group didn’t even bother to give him a good guy card.
Paolo wrote a text full of grievances on the social platform: “We hope to increase our shares in Juventus through a possible capital increase in the club, but this wish has been ignored.”
Paolo has probably never been so frustrated in his life.A financial giant in charge of an annual profit of US$13 billion could only use social platforms to “remind” Juventus: I want to participate in the capital increase, I want to increase my stake, but I am not taken seriously.
Some people sympathize with Paolo and think he is a fan who truly loves Juventus; others question his motives and think he just wants to use Juventus to whitewash Tether’s image.
Regardless of whether the outside world sympathizes or doubts, in the eyes of the Agnelli family, Paolo is still an “outsider”, and the relationship between the two parties has not been cooperation from the beginning, but “preparation.”
Since feelings can’t be exchanged for respect, then use money to exchange it.
From April to October, Tether bought its stake from 8.2% to 10.7% via the open market.Under Italian law, holding more than 10% entitles you to nominate board members.
Juventus Annual General Meeting, Turin, November 7.The atmosphere became turbulent due to Tether’s disturbance.
Tether nominated Francesco Garino, a famous local doctor in Turin and a lifelong Juventus fan, as a director candidate.Paolo tried to tell everyone: we are not barbarians, we are the sons of Turin whose blood is thicker than water.
And the veteran Exor Group has a trump card, Giorgio Chiellini.The legendary captain, who played for Juventus for 17 years and won nine Serie A trophies, was pushed to the front.
This is Exor’s strategy, to use celebrities to fight against capital and feelings to fight against money.
In the end, Tether won a board seat with difficulty, but in a board of directors where the Agnelli family has absolute control, a seat means that you can listen in and make suggestions, but you can’t touch the steering wheel.
Concluding remarks from John Elkann, the fifth generation of the Agnelli family: “We are proud to have been shareholders of Juventus for more than a century. We have no intention of selling our shares, but we are open to constructive ideas from all stakeholders.”
A more straightforward translation of this sentence would be: This is not just a business, this is our family’s territory.You can come in and have tea, but don’t try to be the master here.
Pride and Prejudice of Old Money
Behind John’s words are a family’s 102 years of glory and pride.
On July 24, 1923, 31-year-old Edoardo Agnelli took over as President of Juventus.From that day on, the fate of the Agnelli family and Juventus was tightly tied together.The family’s Fiat auto empire was Italy’s largest private company for much of the 20th century, employing countless workers and feeding millions of families.
Juventus is another symbol of the family’s power.With 36 Serie A titles, 2 Champions League titles, and 14 Italian Cups, Juventus is the most successful club in the history of Italian football and one of the sources of national pride for Italians.
However, the inheritance history of the Agnelli family is full of blood and cracks.
In 2000, Agnelli heir Edoardo Agnelli jumped from a viaduct, ending his battle with depression.Three years later, family patriarch Gianni Agnelli died.The baton of power had to be handed over to his grandson John Elkann.
John was born in New York and raised in Paris.He can speak English, French, and Italian, but Italian has an obvious foreign accent.In the eyes of many old-school Italians, he was just an agent who gained power through blood.
It took John 20 years to prove himself worthy of the Agnelli family.
He restructured Fiat and annexed Chrysler to create Stellantis, the world’s fourth largest automobile group; he pushed Ferrari into the capital market, doubling its market value; he bought The Economist, extending the influence of the Agnelli family from Italy to the world.
Unfortunately, the rift within the family is becoming public.In September 2025, John Elkann’s mother Margherita submitted a 1998 “will” to the Turin court, claiming that the inheritance left to her by her father Gianni had been misappropriated by John.The mother and son went to court, which was a huge scandal in Italy, which values family honor.
In this context, selling Juventus is equivalent to admitting the end of the family’s glory and admitting that one is inferior to his ancestors.
In order to keep Juventus, John is selling off other properties like crazy.
Just a few days before Tether issued an acquisition offer, the Exor Group was busy selling its GEDI Media Group to the Greek Greek media group Antenna Group for 140 million euros.GEDI owns two major public opinion mouthpieces, La Repubblica and La Stampa. The status of these two newspapers in Italy is no less than that of Juventus in Italian football.
After the news came out, there was an uproar in Italy.The Italian government even invoked the “golden power” bill, requiring Exor to protect jobs and editorial independence during the sale.
The newspaper’s loss is a liability and must be eliminated; Juventus’s loss is a totem and must be retained.
This choice exposed the embarrassment of the old aristocracy.They are no longer able to maintain the territory of the past, and can only work hard to retain the one that best represents the glory of the family.
So, even though Paolo’s takeover offer came with a market premium of up to 20%, John Elkann still viewed it as a threat.
In the values of European old money, the quality of wealth has a chain of contempt.
Every copper plate in the Agnelli family is soaked with the smell of engine oil.It is an industrial monument made of steel, rubber, the roar of engines and the sweat of millions of workers.This wealth is visible and tangible, and it represents order, control, and a century-long social contract.
And Paolo’s money comes from cryptocurrency, from an industry that has grown wildly and is full of controversy in the past decade.
The lessons learned from the past are still fresh in our minds.
Just a few years ago, the blockchain company DigitalBit signed an 85 million euro sponsorship contract with two Serie A giants, Inter Milan and Roma. However, DigitalBits defaulted on sponsorship fees due to a broken capital chain, and the two clubs had to terminate the contract, leaving a mess.
Not to mention the serial collapse of the cryptocurrency industry in 2022.At that time, Luna’s logo was hung on the Washington Nationals’ stadium, and FTX’s name was also named on the home court of the Miami Heat.In the view of the Agnelli family, the cryptocurrency industry is full of speculation and bubbles.
In the eyes of the Agnelli family, Paolo will always be an “outsider”.Not because of his origins, but because of his money.
A totem that needs to be saved
But the thing is, Juventus really needs money.
Today, Juventus is in deep trouble. It all started on July 10, 2018, when Juventus announced the signing of the 33-year-old Ronaldo.Transfer fee of 100 million euros, annual salary of 30 million euros after tax, for 4 years.
This is the largest transfer in Serie A history and the highest salary in Serie A history.The then chairman of Juventus, Andrea Agnelli, the fourth generation of the Agnelli family, said excitedly at the shareholders’ meeting: “This is the most important signing in the history of Juventus. We are going to win the Champions League with Ronaldo.”
The city of Turin was boiling.Fans flocked to Juventus stores to snap up shirts bearing Ronaldo’s name.In just 24 hours of signing, the club sold more than 520,000 shirts, setting a record in football history.Everyone believes that Ronaldo will lead Juventus to the top of Europe.
But Juventus didn’t win the Champions League.In 2019, it was reversed by Ajax; in 2020, it was eliminated by Lyon; in 2021, it was defeated by Porto.In August 2021, Ronaldo suddenly left the team and switched to Manchester United.Not only did Juventus fail to recoup their investment, they fell into a deeper financial quagmire.
Actuaries later calculated a total ledger, including transfer fees, salaries and taxes, and the total cost of signing Ronaldo was as high as 340 million euros.He scored 101 goals in three years at Juventus, with each goal worth an average of €2.8 million.
For a club of the size of Juventus, the significance of the Champions League is not more about the honor bonus, but the cash flow switch: broadcasting shares, match day income, and bonuses in sponsorship terms, many of which are tied to the Champions League.Once they lose the Champions League, their books will immediately become thinner, and the team will be forced to use accounting methods to plug this loophole.
Juventus sold Pjanic to the Spanish giants Barcelona for 60 million euros and bought Arthur from Barcelona for 72 million euros.The two transactions were officially unrelated to each other, but everyone knew it was a carefully designed exchange.Juventus actually only had to pay the difference in cash of €12 million, but could record tens of millions of euros in “capital gains” on their books.
This kind of accounting method is actually not uncommon in football circles, but Juventus went too far.
A prosecutor’s investigation found that the club had inflated profits by €282 million through 42 similar suspicious transactions over three years.After the scandal was revealed, the entire board of directors, including chairman Andrea Agnelli, resigned en masse.
What follows is punishment for the team: deduction of league points, failure to qualify for the Champions League, and long-term bans for executives.This has further led to an even more terrifying vicious cycle. The team’s declining record has led to a sharp drop in income, which has led to an inability to recruit players, and an inability to recruit players has led to an even worse record.
Starting with a loss of 39.6 million euros in the 2018-19 season, Juventus’s financial situation has been declining, and by the 2022-23 season, the loss has reached 123.7 million euros.From the peak of nine consecutive Serie A championships to the current huge losses for consecutive years, in November 2025, the Exor Group had to once again increase its capital for Juventus by nearly 100 million euros.
This is already the third time Exor Group has given blood to Juventus in two years.The Exor Group also owns assets such as Ferrari, Stellantis Auto Group, and The Economist magazine. Juventus’s continued losses are eroding the profits of the entire group.In the 2024 financial report, Exor Group’s net profit fell by 12%, and analysts pointed out that Juventus has become a negative equity dragging down the group’s performance.
John Elkann was in a dilemma and didn’t know how to make a decision.
And Paolo, with $13 billion in annual profits, is knocking on the door.He has money, he has patience, he has love for Juventus.
This should have been a perfect deal, if there wasn’t that big mountain called “class” standing in the middle.
Dreams under the olive tree
Paolo’s knocks never got an answer, so he made his own choice.
On December 12, Paolo bypassed all private roundtables and made the offer public directly through the Italian Stock Exchange.Paolo cornered John Elkann and forced him to answer this question in front of all Italy: Do you want money, or do you want the family’s face?
As the news spread, Juventus’s stock price soared, and the market expressed its desire for “new money.””Gazzetta dello Sport” and “Gazzetta dello Sport” both reported the matter on the front page, and the entire Apennine Peninsula is waiting for the Agnelli family’s decision.
The Agnelli family’s rejection was both expected and unreasonable.
Unsurprisingly, the pride of the Agnelli family does not allow them to bow to new money.It’s unreasonable, because judging from their current financial situation, rejecting this huge sum of money requires an almost tragic stubbornness.
For Paolo, he hopes to use the money he earns to save his childhood idol.After all, companies have nationalities. Although Tether is a digital nomad company with operations all over the world, its CEO is Italian and its heart is in Italy.
From the perspective of the Agnelli family, they are not only guarding a club, but also a family’s 102-year glory and a symbol of the Italian industrial era.
This is no longer a game of business logic, it is a collision of two beliefs.
In the eyes of John Elkann, the bronze door must be closed, because standing outside the door are speculators trying to launder their identities; but in the eyes of Paolo, that door should be opened, because standing outside the door are children with Italian blood who can save this team.
However, time was not on the side of the old aristocracy.
In the same week that Exor rejected Tether, Premier League champion Manchester City announced a contract extension with the encryption trading platform OKX, and the advertising on the chest of the jersey is worth over 100 million.European giants such as Paris Saint-Germain, Barcelona, and AC Milan have already established in-depth cooperation with encryption companies.In Asia, South Korea’s K-League and Japan’s J-League have also begun to accept cryptocurrency sponsorships.
For new money to enter traditional industries controlled by old money, it is no longer a question of “will”, but “in what way”.Football is just one of the battlefields. In the field of art auctions, Sotheby’s and Christie’s have begun to accept cryptocurrency payments; in the field of real estate, luxury home transactions in cities such as Dubai and Miami can already be completed with Bitcoin.The same conflicts are happening all over the world.
Paolo’s charge, whether it succeeds or fails, is testing the boundaries of this era: when a generation uses new methods to create huge wealth, are they qualified to sit at the poker table in the old world controlled by old money?
At the end of the story, the scene is fixed in the olive grove in the suburbs.
32 years ago, a black-haired boy sat there, staring at the black and white striped figure on the TV and cheering to the sound of his grandparents working.At that time, he would not have thought that one day he would stand outside that door, waiting for an answer.
The closed bronze door was still cold and majestic at this moment.Behind it lies a hundred years of glory of the Agnelli family and the last afterglow of the old industrial era.
Now it’s not open for new money, but this time, the knockers won’t budge.Because he knew that it was only a matter of time before the door opened.
