£40m seems a fair chunk for Nathan Ake, especially as he’s unlikely to be first choice but cover for Laporte.
That said, if you look at most of the better signings of recent seasons the buying club’s paid over the odds to get the deal done, so idk.
Maybe we just view transfer fees through the norm when we were growing up. Think someone could easily make an argument as to it being over the top (compared to, say, what Laporte cost) or fair value (compared to, say, Maguire at £80m who he’s about on a par with).
Summary: Dunno.