Kylian Mbappe's €150m Signing-On Fee Means PSG Have Effectively Bought Him Twice

Paris Saint-Germain have finally convinced Kylian Mbappe to choose them over Real Madrid.

It was officially confirmed on Saturday that Mbappe had signed a new contract at PSG, after rejecting an "almost identical" offer from Real.

Mbappe had little more than a month remaining on his existing PSG contract, so a move to Real would have been on a free transfer.

It would have been anything but free though.

Although Real would not have paid PSG a transfer fee, Mbappe's signing-on fee alone was set to be higher than all bar two transfer fees in the history of soccer.

It is understood that, because the offers from PSG and Real were so similar, Mbappe is still going to receive such a payment.

According to journalist and Spanish soccer expert Guillem Balague, Mbappe is set to receive a €150 million fee for signing his new deal with PSG. That figure does not include his salary.

To put that into context, PSG paid Monaco €180m when they bought Mbappe from their Ligue 1 rivals in 2018, after an initial loan spell.

PSG teammate Neymar is the only player in world soccer to have cost more than Mbappe in terms of his transfer fee.

Neymar moved for €222m in 2017 when PSG activated the buy-out clause in his Barcelona contract.

Barcelona were furious at the time. They had believed that such a hefty price tag had made Neymar unattainable.

But for PSG he was very attainable.

PSG's unrivaled wealth saw them take Barcelona's prized asset without asking.

And now they have effectively bought Mbappe - the world's second most expensive footballer - twice.

Kylian Mbappe pictured (left) celebrating a goal for PSG with teammate Neymar in April 2022

IMAGO/HMB-Media/Antonio Borga