America’s Cup leaves €3.5m loss for Barcelona Port despite 'positive' impact

The Port of Barcelona recorded a financial loss of €3.5 million from hosting the America’s Cup sailing competition, held in the Catalan capital between August and October last year. Despite this, the event had a “very positive” overall impact, as it accelerated several key investments.

Barcelona was chosen as the host city for the America’s Cup in 2022, leading to significant refurbishments along the city's seafront in the following two years. However, despite Emirates Team New Zealand winning the competition and earning the right to select the next host city, once again, both local authorities and organizers ruled out holding the next edition in Barcelona.

"We cannot sum up 2024 without talking about the America's Cup," the port's president, José Alberto Carbonell, said during a press conference on Tuesday. The economic impact on the port's finances was €4.5 million, which was mainly focused on adapting the area for the teams and the competition between 2022 and 2024.

The income from the competition was around €1 million, thus the negative economic balance of €3.5 million.

"It has been a very important event," Carbonell said during the press conference and praised the sports event.

"We can be proud of having been the host city of the teams and the organization, and we are proud of combining the event with the port's usual activity, which was not negatively impacted," he added.

From a "reputation and international projection" point of view, the America's Cup was an "enriching challenge" and a "huge excuse" to accelerate several investments, such as the zero-emissions ferry shuttle.

Despite the financial loss from the event, the Port of Barcelona reported “extraordinarily positive” financial results for 2024, which, according to its president, "strengthen the infrastructure’s financial capabilities." Carbonell also announced plans for "a new round of investments" this year.

The port earned €63 million in 2024, a 26% increase from the previous year. For the first time ever, total revenue exceeded €200 million, up from €189 million last year.

Alongside these financial achievements, the port also set a new record for cruise ship traffic, welcoming 3.65 million passengers—a 2.4% increase from 2023 figures.

Those cruises with Barcelona as their base port mainly drove the figure, which increased by 7.4% compared to 2023, surpassing the over two million passengers. 

Looking forward to 2025, Carbonell believes the number of cruise stops will increase, but the docking boats will be smaller.

Reduce cruise ship terminals

Hours before announcing the Port of Barcelona's financial results, the city council urged the infrastructure to reduce the number of cruise ship terminals to five.

The city's deputy mayor, Laia Bonet, said in an interview with Catalan public broadcaster TV3 that she told the port of their intentions to renew their agreement but to reduce from seven to five terminals. The request comes from a deal with the anti-austerity Barcelona en Comú party, the party of former mayor Ada Colau.

"We have reached our limit," she said. Meanwhile, Carbonell acknowledged receiving such a message but preferred to have a more "discreet" dialogue with local authorities.

"We negotiated, spoke about it, and reached an agreement which was made public in January 2018," he added.