FEG Not Paying Fighters (From Nightmare of Battle)

Nightmare of Battle has posted a story on FEG and their fighters not getting paid, and it's not optimistic:
 

As you know, several FEG fighters have not been paid their guaranteed fight money. Bibiano Fernandes, Gary Goodridge, Andy Souwer, etc. Japanese MMA magazine Kamipro editor-in-chief Saito talked about the situation yesterday.

Apparently this has been going on since the latter half of the 1st year of DREAM and it’s not only foreign fighters who haven’t been paid on time, it’s Japanese fighters as well.

It also seems like FEG have barely stayed alive these recent years. They were only able to pay fighters due to the money they got from the TV broadcast of Dynamite!! events in recent years.

He reveals some of the reasons for them losing money:

* Due to the K-1 tax evasion in the past (which caused K-1 godfather Ishii to go to jail) additional tax has to be paid.
* The PRIDE Yakuza/Fuji TV scandal and the Akiyama greasing event lost them sponsors.
* Fight purses increasing.
* Decreased money from TV channels (last year it was down 30-50%).
etc.

Basically income has decreased while expenses have increased and it seems like the situation is even worse than we can guess.

The PUJI deal seems to take a while since all kinds of preparations that need time are needed. But it’s very bad right now, no announcement on the schedule of MAX, Koshien isn’t 100%. He says: “I heard a somewhat unpleasant rumor…”.

In short, PUJI is the last ray of hope. If PUJI funds do not come in, it’s “the end”. Another question is if FEG can endure until then. At worst the 2010 World GP and DREAM.16 might be postponed or terminated completely.

I'm still holding on to hope that the situation is resolved fairly soon, but every time we hear news about FEG now it's worse than before.  When they can't afford to pay their big name fighters, it's hard not to expect the worst.  Fingers crossed that the money from the PUJI deal comes in quickly and FEG can get themselves out of the hole they've fallen into.