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From BBC Sport:
Chelsea have recorded losses of £140m, the biggest in football history.
It was a severe increase from the £88m loss they made last year, with the Blues citing a 'series of exceptional one-off items' behind the rise.
'These figures reflect the continuing restructuring of the business which we began in 2003-4,' Chelsea chief Peter Kenyon told the club website.
'The rise is down to some exceptional items that were necessary to help us in our aim to break-even by 2009-10.'
The termination of a deal with Umbro, which cost £25.5m, plus a total loss of £22.8m over the transfers of Adrian Mutu and Juan Sebastien Veron and the £5m for Academy recruitment were picked out as the 'exceptional items'.
Kenyon added: 'We terminated the Umbro contract which had a huge impact on these figures, but we have not yet seen any of the financial benefit of our new adidas contract.
'Similarly these figures do not include any of the monies from our new sponsorship deal with Samsung, which was the biggest in Premiership history.'
Chelsea's wage bill was reduced from £115.5m to £108.9m, while transfer fees, and the additional fees involved in buying players, fell from £175.1m to £101m.
Turnover dropped from £152.1m to £146.6m, with the PLC putting that down to the sale of Chelsea Village Travel, the club travel agents.
Chelsea have used Roman Abramovich's fortunes to fund a transfer spend of nearly £265m which helped them win their first domestic league title for 50 years when they won the Premiership last season.
The annual payroll doubled to £115m, after £175m was spent on new players. For comparison, Man United's payroll was £77m, and West Brom's was just £11.5m. Wages accounted for a huge 76% of Chelsea's total income last year.
Without a loan of £115m from the owner, Roman Abramovich, the club would not be considered a going concern by their auditors. How would they survive if he lost interest?
Chelsea's gamble seems sure to pay off with a place in the Champions League, but other clubs have invested heavily, and have almost been bankrupted in the process.
The bigger they come...
See also the BBC report
Footnote: Lincoln City have announced record profits of £735,000 for the 12 months up to June 2004.
