CEO Mark Ashton has revealed that the outgoing fees Town have spent since the takeover are matched by the sums brought in from player sales.
The Blues have added significant strength to their playing staff over the last two seasons but Ashton says that’s been done while still balancing the books in terms of fees paid and received.
"I think the interesting thing for me from the playing side is player trading, us buying and selling players at all age groups,” he said at last night’s Fans’ Forum.
"Since we’ve been here, you’ve seen us spend money on players. Harry Clarke from Arsenal, Nathan Broadhead from Everton, Leif Davis from Leeds, Conor Chaplin from Barnsley, Wes Burns from Fleetwood, George Edmundson from Rangers, the list goes on.
"We spend money in transfer fees and we’ve paid probably, bar none, the largest transfer fees outside of the Championship and we’ve paid transfer fees larger than I’d say the majority of the Championship clubs in the last few years.
"However, let me give you an example, what people don’t see is that we buy and sell, so we’ve sold some players on the way through as well.
"If you take a three-year period, take last year, this year and forecast out next year, you’ve got all the money that we’ve spent on those players and you’ll have read in the press that people have purported we’ve paid and they’re not far off, but we also brought money in.
"If you take the money that we’ve spend versus the money that we’ve brought in over that period, last year, this year and next year, the cash we’ve spent is literally zero. That’s player trading, that’s what we do.
"[Chief operating officer] Luke Werhun plays a big part in that, [club secretary] Stuart Hayton plays a big part in that, the recruitment team play a big part in that. Over the three-year period, the cash spend is almost zero on those players.
"I think you would have expected me to say it was far larger, but we trade. We’ve traded some of the younger players, we’ve traded likes of Dozzell and Co who wanted to move on, but we know what we’re doing in that arena and I think that’s a pretty good return.
"If you think of what we’ve spent, next to nothing cash-wise, but look at the value on the pitch - Clarke, Broadhead, Leif, Chaplin, Burns, Edmundson, it goes on.
"If we decided we wanted to trade or sell someone, we’d be a lot better off than zero. The value of the team for what we’ve spent on the team I think is really good and that will only continue to grow.
"It continues to grow as well because we have a manager who certainly knows how to develop those players and he’s absolutely instrumental in persuading and helping us to persuade the Premier League players in Broadhead, Clarke and Leif to leave Premier League clubs, join a League One club and come on the journey with us.
"That gives you a little bit of a flavour for when we talk about player trading and what we mean.”