Eintracht Frankfurt has stabilized in recent years – both in sporting and financial terms. The one is of course linked to the other. The days of the elevator team – between 1996 and 2012 they were relegated and promoted back to the Bundesliga four times - are a thing of the past.

It has also been a long time since Eintracht had to worry about its license - as was last the case in 2002, when it was threatened with a move into amateur football following the surprising exit of sports marketing company Octagon. Perhaps the most visible sign of this new stability is the fact that even the German TV programme Sportschau is talking less and less about the "Diva on the Main“.

On the one hand, this development has to do with influential managers such as former CEO Heribert Bruchhagen, and long-time club president Peter Fischer, and on the other hand with the somewhat different model of Eintracht Frankfurt Fußball AG. Three things stand out when looking at its shareholders. First, banks are on board. And they are not just sponsors, such as Frankfurter Sparkasse, or holders of stadium naming rights (the Waldstadion became Commerzbank Arena, and in mid-2020 changed again to Deutsche Bank Park. Banks are also shareholders. Bankhaus Metzler, DZ Bank, Landesbank Hessen-Thüringen and BHF-Bank together hold a 7.3% stake under label „Friends of Eintracht“, with a further 3% held by securities trading bank Steubing. This is remarkable insofar as soccer clubs are generally complicated business partners from a banking perspective. As borrowers, the clubs' most important assets are the market value of their players. And as investments, on a single match day there is a risk of a sudden loss in value. BVB shares illustrated this at the end of May last year, when the championship was lost in the final minutes.

Secondly, Eintracht's shareholder base includes entrepreneurs, who contribute to the club having a professional view of future issues, such as digitalization and internationalization. For example, digital entrepreneur Sven Janssen owns 5%, via „Herzschlag Eintracht GmbH“ (Heartbeat), while the „Freunde des Adlers“ (the eagle being the club mascot) of former Goldman Sachs investment banker and current Supervisory Board Chairman Philip Holzer and global logistics manager Stephen Orenstein hold 16.8%. Digitalization (eFootball) and internationalization in particular are key initiatives to make income less dependent on revenue from the transfer market.

Third and last, Eintracht has managed to raise 40 million euros in capital in recent years without diluting the main shareholder's stake. The club still holds a clear majority of 67.89%. Other clubs have learned that any shake-up of the club's shareholding immediately triggers protests and political discussions. The fact that Frankfurt has managed to reconcile the interests of minority shareholders and the club is also to the credit of former President Fischer, who was able to rally the support of large sections of the fanbase during his more than 20 years in office. As a result, he was able to push through decisions that elsewhere would turn the terraces against the club.

This coexistence model between the club and minority shareholders has aroused the curiosity of other clubs. This is evident at Werder Bremen, where a regional alliance of entrepreneurs recently bought an 18 percent stake for 38 million euros. The club had up to then been sole shareholder.