UEFA pursuing legal action against FIFA, president Gianni Infantino after failed World Cup stake sale plan

BELGRADE, SERBIA - APRIL 03: FIFA President Gianni Infantino speaks during the 49th Ordinary UEFA Congress at Sava Centar on April 03, 2025 in Belgrade, Serbia. (Photo by Francesco Scaccianoce - UEFA/UEFA via Getty Images) Francesco Scaccianoce - UEFA via Getty Images UEFA is taking legal action in New York against FIFA, Gianni Infantino and Thrive Capital, the lead investor in the failed $20 billion World Cup investment plan, according to The Times and Front Office Sports . This is not a lawsuit. UEFA, instead, is wanting to go through the discovery process to get information from the three parties in order to take that to Swiss authorities — FIFA’s headquarters are in Switzerland — as part of a criminal complaint. The end goal is to have charges brought against Infantino and possibly other FIFA officials. Infantino is accused of "fraudulently" offering a stake in the FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) without going through the proper FIFA channels. Thrive and founder Joshua Kushner were set to pay FIFA $4.2 billion for a 20% stake in a new company that would run the organization’s commercial events, which includes the men’s and women’s World Cup. "Under the terms Infantino announced, those investors stood to acquire a permanent financial interest in FIFA's commercial arm for $4.2bn, implying an absurdly low enterprise value of only approximately $20bn, a figure that was neither the product of an open, competitive auction, nor tested by any independent valuer,” UEFA’s complaint reads. That $4.2 billion figure could be a "fraudulently off-market price promoted by Infantino for his own benefit,” it adds. "In truth, it was a vehicle for Infantino and that small circle to acquire a permanent stake in and otherwise profit from FIFA's most valuable assets to the detriment of FIFA, its members, and other parties within the football family," the complaint continued. "Infantino pushed the plan through internal FIFA approval only days earlier at a hastily convened meeting where a limited number of FIFA's management officials and employees - some of whom had never heard of the plan - were given mere hours to sign off on an unprecedented multi-billion dollar scheme." Infantino’s received criticism from all corners of the soccer world after The Times reported the details of the plan. Various confederations, including UEFA and Concacaf, issued scathing statements against the FIFA president with a number calling for " meaningful change " atop the governing body’s hierarchy. UEFA, which released a statement saying it had lost confidence in Infantino’s ability to lead, threatened to boycott all FIFA-run competitions unless FIFA issued assurances that the sell off plan would not be revisited. Days later, the plan was withdrawn .