The list of Barcelona players having trouble with their taxes is growing, thanks to Neymar apparently running afoul of tax authorities in Brazil. While the details of his transgressions are so far unknown, Brazilian courts have already taken a pretty huge step against Neymar:
Brazilian court freezes Neymar’s assets in tax evasion probe
The Barcelona superstar has had nearly $50 million in assets frozen as his home country seeks tax evasion allegations against him.
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Breaking away from FIFA ... .Brazilian court freezes almost $50M of Neymar's assets. Court alleges tax evasion against Barcelona star
— Rob Harris (@RobHarris) September 25, 2015 That is a lot of money that he now can’t touch, which suggests that whatever tax evasion Neymar allegedly was a part of was significant. The figure also brings to mind the controversy surrounding his transfer to Barcelona, in which his father received significant “unofficial” payouts to help facilitate the transfer. Again, we don’t yet know if this tax evasion allegation and the transfer scandal are linked, but it seems strongly possible under the circumstances, especially considering he and his father were already under investigation for exactly that.
Neymar is also far from the only Barcelona star dealing with tax woes. Lionel Messi has been dealing with tax evasion charges for several years thanks to a system set up by his father that reportedly ran some of Messi's money through shell corporations. Just two weeks ago, Javier Mascherano was also brought up on tax evasion charges stemming from running part of his Nike sponsorship money through an American company. Heck, the club itself had to face tax fraud charges over Neymar's transfer.
Maybe Barcelona needs to have a “Taxes And You: How Not To Break The Law” seminar for their players at some point soon. They seem to be struggling with how to avoid that.
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