Spending in the Premier League's summer transfer window went into overdrive this year, with £870m (€1.18bn) being spent on transfer fees - adding in the 2014/2015 mid-season window the annual calendar spend was more than £1bn.
That was more than double the spend in Italy's Serie A, which was in second place, spending £405m.
This figure is also over double the GDP of Tonga - and more than 17 other countries' total income.
Premier League spend relative to the total income of small states, Business Insider
The league's record smashing new TV deal comes into play at the end of this season, so the payoff for avoiding relegation, or gaining promotion this year is massive.
Under the new deal the bottom club in England's top flight will be given £99m per season, with the champions getting a bonus of more than £150m - clubs will also get extra bonuses for being featured in live TV games.
During the 2016 season Sky will pay £111,111 per minute - and £1,852 for each second of live televised Premier League football.
And that's it. Aside from deal sheets pending. And add-ons adding on. Nearly 900 million quid. £481.1m net. Fella. pic.twitter.com/7H7qlAA9Yp
— sportingintelligence (@sportingintel) September 1, 2015
Alex Thorpe, senior manager in the Sports Business Group at Deloitte commented on the business being done by England's top clubs:
"Looking across Europe, Premier League clubs' gross and net spending this summer is more than double that of any other European league. The driving force behind this is the growth and distribution mechanism of the league's broadcast rights."
He continues, "Earlier this year we reported the remarkable rebalancing of revenues and costs, such that Premier League clubs collectively generated pre-tax profitability for the first time since 1999, with clubs set to enjoy a further revenue boost when the next broadcast deals start in 2016.
"Therefore, despite a new record level of player transfer spending this year, collectively Premier League clubs have a chance to invest in playing talent while remaining profitable in a way that was previously not the case."
BBC
Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger has branded UEFA's financial fair play rules a failure - "It has gone," he told the media.
"I have seen the signs coming from Uefa for a while. I thought it would happen but now it is not possible. What’s happened is the clubs threatened to go to civil court – not only through sport. That brought a lot of insecurity in the decision-making of UEFA so they started to soften the rules a little bit."
The European football body's attempts to tie spending to club's income have stalled after a slew of legal challenges from across the continent.
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