Barcelona faces further punishment that could violate the European Union's Financial Fair Competition (FFP) regulations, but club sources told ESPN they hope to avoid any serious sanctions.

Barcelona was fined €500,000 in 2023 for violating FFP rules, and the Times, reported on Tuesday, could face tougher fines this time, such as deductions before next season’s Champions League, or reducing restrictions on the number of players registered for the match.

The violations are related to the revenue registered by Barcelona, ​​which are not considered relevant under UEFA regulations.

In recent years, to alleviate financial problems, Barcelona has sold a percentage of revenue from broadcast rights, a stake in the club's in-house media company and recently acquired a VIP seat at Spotify Camp Nou, which is being developed.

These operations (called "leverage") are accepted by Laliga, but not by European Olive Oil (Uefa) and they will issue any Santion Barça announcement later this month.

Sources in Barcelona have tried to downplay the seriousness of the potential violation and told ESPN that the maximum fine they expected was small.

"We have recently completed the financial audit process conducted by the UEFA company every two years," a club source told ESPN. "The club has not been notified yet, the conclusions and possible consequences of the audit have not been notified.

“The main difference is that UEFA does not consider certain actions to be ordinary income, so-called leverage, unlike the Lariga standard, which does see them as ordinary operating income.”

UEFA told ESPN they were unable to provide the latest information on individual cases.

The governing body said: "The UEFA Club Financial Control Agency will review all relevant cases and will issue further announcements on updates and settlements around mid-June."

Barcelona's 2023 fine is related to "profits of disposal of intangible assets (unless participants transfer) in the case of incorrectly reported in the fiscal year 2022, which are not related to the relevant income in the regulations."

The club brought the case to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS), but failed last October.

Cass said the €500,000 fine was “really relatively modest” and warned them of “harder” sanctions if they violated the regulations again.

Information from ESPN's Dale Johnson contributed to the report.