AUDIO: HSV Hamburg reduces its debts – point deduction averted (1 min)
As of: December 8th, 2025 9:54 p.m
Handball Bundesliga team HSV Hamburg has reduced the debts of its Spielbetriebs GmbH and is thus meeting the requirements of the HBL. Six creditors waived claims totaling around four million euros. This includes entrepreneur Philipp J. Müller, who is taking over 24.9 percent of the shares in the gaming company.
The club announced this on Monday evening after a general meeting. The threatening scenario of a point deduction by the Handball Bundesliga (HBL) is now off the table for the ninth-placed team. “HBL’s equity guidelines are now met,” said HSVH managing director Christian Hüneburg, who took over responsibility for the Hanseatic team last October together with ex-professional Johannes Bitter.
Bitter: “Glad that the speculation ends with this”
“I’m glad that the speculation about the handball sports club ends with this,” said Bitter. “We were unable to go public with interim results, even though we had seen the result for months. This led to occasional unrest.”
HBL managing director Frank Bohmann was also on site and explained that they were checking the numbers carefully, but as of today he was optimistic that the Hamburgers would not have to be penalized with a point deduction at the end of March.
License last only after the fact
HSV Hamburg only received the license subsequently for both the current season and the 2024/2025 season. The 2011 German champions and 2013 Champions League winners had their license subsequently revoked in the 2015/2016 series. The club then restarted in the fourth-tier league and achieved promotion to the Bundesliga for the 2021/2022 season.
Mountain of debt of around ten million euros
Handball Sport Management and Marketing GmbH (HSM), which runs the game, had accumulated a mountain of debt of around ten million euros since 2019. According to HSVH, six creditors have now waived claims amounting to around four million euros.
Entrepreneur Müller enables “financial liberation”
Among them is the entrepreneur Philipp J. Müller, who is taking over 24.9 percent of HSM’s shares through one of his companies with a further six million euros. “Philipp J. Müller has extremely strengthened the club over the last two years, kept our backs free and made today’s financial liberation possible,” said Hüneburg.
The club announced that Müller’s participation was deliberately below the blocking minority at his own request. The parent club HSV Hamburg eV remains the main shareholder of the Bundesliga team.
