Cristiano Ronaldo Wants to Sell Tableware in Asia | Business

Selling tableware may not boost Cristiano Ronaldo’s fortune, but it’s likely to be less of a hassle than crypto assets. The footballer has entered the designer porcelain business with historic Portuguese firm Vista Alegre, just as it celebrates its 200th anniversary, according to a deal announced a few weeks ago. The Saudi Arabian Al-Nassr footballer has acquired 10% of the Portuguese company and 30% of its Spanish subsidiary. The business partnership also includes the creation of a 50% company to expand into the Asian market, taking advantage of Cristiano Ronaldo’s global reach.

Vista Alegre, with its artisanal process and artistic design, is at the opposite end of the liquid and virtual world of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, which partnered with the footballer in 2022 to launch a collection of NFTs (non-fungible tokens), a class of celebrity-related crypto assets. They have since launched four collections inspired by CR7’s biography. One of the incentives for buying is the chance to meet Ronaldo in person, who frequently promotes Binance on his social media, despite being sued by a group of investors who suffered losses. The lawsuit, filed in a Florida court in late 2023, alleges that the footballer “promoted, assisted, and/or actively participated in the offer and sale of unregistered securities in coordination with Binance.” The three initiators of the lawsuit, which is open to other victims, are seeking more than $1 billion from Ronaldo.

Not all of his real estate investments have been successful. In 2022, he sold the apartment he bought in Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue in New York for well below the price he paid. The footballer bought the 8,000-square-foot apartment for $18.5 million in 2015 and decided to sell it four years later. It was not easy, including due to the pandemic, and he managed to sell it only after successive price cuts until it reached $11.32 million.

In addition, his project to create a luxury residential complex in Praia Formosa in Funchal, the capital of the island of Madeira where he was born, is being questioned for its environmental impact and is under suspicion of corruption. Linked to the Pestana Group, with which he operates several hotels in Portugal, Spain, Morocco and the United States, the project involves the construction of 89 apartments 250 meters from what is considered the last virgin beach in Funchal. On his website, all but four of the houses are listed as reserved, with prices ranging from 855,000 to 1.19 million euros.

Prosecutor’s investigation

The handling of this urban project in an environmentally protected area has had various anomalies and is one of the operations being investigated by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, which in January last year indicted the President of the Regional Government of Madeira, Miguel Albuquerque (Social Democratic Party, centre right) and arrested three people on suspicion of corruption. The investigation remains open.

In any case, nothing threatens the fate of Cristiano Ronaldo. This year, the magazine Forbes declared him the highest paid athlete in the world, with an annual income of $ 260 million. Of this, he receives $ 200 for playing in the Saudi league and $ 60 for his off-field businesses, in which he invests in such diverse investments as gyms, bottled water or hair transplants. In late 2023, he entered the media business in Portugal with a group of investors who acquired the Cofina group, now renamed Medialivre. The player became the main individual shareholder of the company that owns the Jornal de Negocios television channels and the Correio da Manhã newspaper, which in the past has had the distinction of causing Ronaldo great distress. It was a headline that spoke of illegal work on the penthouse he bought next to Eduardo VII Park and which he would eventually demolish at the insistence of the Lisbon City Council.

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