Mino Raiola was one of the greatest sports agents in the history of soccer. The 54-year-old Italian passed away on April 30, 2022, but his legacy will remain forever. Raiola was in a hospital in Milan with serious health conditions due to lung disease, and through his Twitter account, his family announced his departure.
He was awarded in 2016 and 2020 as best agent of the year and was described as “King of the Football Market” for his important operations throughout his long career. He began his career as an agent with the sports agent company Sports Promotions, where he assisted in the transfer of players such as Marciano Vink and Wim Jonk.
His first major signing was to arrange Dennis Bergkamp‘s transfer from Ajax to Inter in 1993 in exchange for 7,1 million euros. Furthermore, some of the players that Raiola represented were Mario Balotelli, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Matthijs de Ligt, Paul Pogba, Gianluigi Donnarumma, and Erling Haaland, who was currently his highest-valued player on the market (valued at 150 million euros, according to Transfermarkt).
Mino Raiola’s net worth
Raiola became a millionaire before he turned 20 after buying and selling a local McDonald’s to a property developer. However, referring to the 54-year-old Italian as a sports agent, according to Forbes, his fortune wasUS$ 85 million and he was among the five richest agents in the world.
An estimated 850 million dollars were generated from all the player transfers in which he participated. However, the figure could be higher as many times the deals have clauses that are not communicated to the media. Raiola used to charge a commission for each transfer of his represented players close to 10%.
Raiola made his money count. He lived in Monaco but owned properties in the world’s major cities. One of them is located in Miami and is the ex-mansion of the mobster Al Capone. For the property, he paid US$ 10 million.