An angry Ecclestone told The Times that Di Montezemolo should be the last person to be complaining about how much income the teams receive. “The only thing he has not mentioned is the extra money Ferrari get above all the other teams and all the extra things Ferrari have had for years – the ‘general help’ they are considered to have had in Formula One,” Ecclestone said.
It has always been known that Ferrari, whose presence on the grid is regarded as critical to the success and prestige of the championship, are on a special deal with Ecclestone’s company and get more money than their rivals. But Ecclestone put a figure on that for the first time yesterday, something that could be designed to drive a wedge between the Scuderia and the other teams.
“Ferrari get so much more money than everyone else,” he said. “They know exactly what they get, they are not that stupid, although they are not that bright, either. They get about $80 million (about £54 million) more. When they win the constructors’ championship, which they did this year, they got $80 million more than if McLaren had won it.”
Ecclestone added that the special deal with the Italian sports car manufacturer goes back to the attempt by the teams to form a breakaway championship in 2003, when Ferrari were the first to return to the fold. “They were the only team that broke ranks with the other manufacturers – why did they break ranks?” he said. “That’s where the $80 million comes in. We ‘bought’ Ferrari. We ‘bought’ Ferrari’s loyalty. Our deal with Ferrari was that we ‘bought’ them so they would not go to the others.”
Di Montezemolo’s call for more transparency about the huge annual income of Formula One was interpreted by Ecclestone as a thinly veiled attack on his business ethics. He said that since the first formal deal under which the teams race was signed, in 1981, the so-called Concorde Agreement, they have had the right to examine the finances of the business. “They have the right to send people into the company and search for everything,” Ecclestone said. “Ferrari in particular, more than anybody, from day one, have had the right and they’ve never done it. We have bankers here and we’ve got CVC (CVC Capital Partners, the principal owners of Formula One) checking every single solitary thing. So anybody that starts saying that we’ve done anything wrong, I’ll sue the a*** off them.”
Der Vertrag wurde eben geschlossen und Punkt. Von Sportlicher bevorzugung wie viele behaupten steht hier nix... 
