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More and more football clubs are looking for new cash flows thanks to cryptocurrencies. In the United Kingdom, almost all of those who make up the elite have made deals with companies in this sector. Partnerships that can be lucrative, but also risky for clubs or their supporters.
Football clubs are becoming more and more fond of cryptocurrencies. This is particularly evident in the United Kingdom, where 17 of the 20 clubs in the Premier League have a partnership with a company in this sector, found the British tabloid Daily Mail, in an investigation into the links between the world of football and that of bitcoins, blockchain or NFTs, published Tuesday, November 23.
The British daily does not quote them, but the three British formations not yet to have succumbed to the sirens of cryptocurrencies seem to be Burnley, Chelsea and Norwich City, according to research carried out by France 24.
Win-win marriage?
Everyone else has at least one partnership with one group in that industry. These can be cryptocurrency exchange platforms like CoinJar, which has won over Brentford, investment companies such as eToro, which has forged partnerships with several clubs (Arsenal, Newcastle or even Aston Villa), or gaming sites with cryptocurrencies like Yolo Group (creator of Bitcoin Casino) which has partnered with Southampton.
This rapprochement between the elite of British football and the world of bitcoins or ethereum is presented as the alliance of the future. It would be a win-win marriage for clubs and fans, assures Arsenal, Manchester City and others in their press releases.
Training finds a new source of income. After more than a year of lean cows due to the health crisis, which has weighed heavily on their finances, the clubs hope to rake in tens of millions of euros thanks to these new partnerships.
Elsewhere in the UK, clubs have already won big thanks to cryptocurrency. The agreement between Paris Saint-Germain and the Soros.com site would provide guaranteed income of 2.5 million euros per year to the club in the capital, analyzed the newspaper L’Équipe. In Mexico, the Necaxa club in Mexico raised $ 1.5 million by selling 1% of its shares in the form of NFT (“Non Fungible Token” which are digital tokens with attached property rights), reports the site Sport Business Journal.
This potential windfall is all the more important for British clubs as they could well lose the income of online betting sites. These are among the main sponsors of English clubs. Of the twenty elite clubs, nine have a jersey sponsored by brands like Betway (West Ham), Betvictor (Fulham) or W88 (Crystal Palace). These agreements bring in around 75 million euros per season to the clubs concerned, but the British legislator is considering banning these partnerships which promote online betting.
“I think football clubs will further intensify their partnerships with companies in the cryptocurrency sector in order to reduce their dependence on sponsorship of online betting sites,” said Charlie Bannister, specialist at the SGI Sports marketing agency, when asked. by the Daily Mail.
Risky games for fans
These agreements will also allow fans “to be better associated with the life of their favorite club”, assured, in August, Everton FC to justify their partnership with Socios.com, a creator of sports cryptocurrencies which is associated with dozens. football clubs around the world, including PSG and FC Barcelona.
In the UK, Socios.com – founded by French serial entrepreneur Alexandre Dreyfus – has partnerships with Everton, Manchester City, Leeds, Aston Villa and Arsenal. This company creates digital tokens in the club’s colors, which fans can purchase to gain the right to participate in certain decisions.
The supporters do not necessarily become shareholders of the club but can, through surveys conducted online, influence the choice of the color of the scarf worn on a given day by the coach, or the music to play in the stadium when ‘a goal is scored. “It’s a way of standing out from the crowd of fans,” summarizes Max Rabinovitch, head of corporate strategy at Socios.com, interviewed by the Sport Business Journal site.
This new obligation, in some clubs, to have to buy the right to participate in certain cosmetic decisions was very badly experienced by several groups of English supporters. Those of West Ham even managed, in 2019, to convince the club’s management to end the partnership with Socios.com arguing that “it is a mechanism to financially exploit the commitment of the fans alongside the club, which should rather be rewarded ”.
Not to mention the danger of leaving your savings there. The value of the digital token, once issued, may change depending on demand. “These are speculative assets that are not subject to any regulation,” warned Charles Randall, chairman of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA, the British regulator of financial markets), questioned by the Daily Mail. To have their say, “fans will have to venture into the cryptocurrency ecosystem, an environment that very few know,” regretted the group of Leeds supporters, after the agreement reached in August between their favorite club. and Socios.com.
This race for sponsors 2.0 has also prompted some of the biggest clubs in the world to get their feet wet in cryptocurrencies. Manchester City suspended its agreement with 3Key on November 19, just a week after signing it. Serious doubts about the legitimacy of this company, which claims to be a “specialist in decentralized finance”, had been raised by Internet users who had failed to find any trace online of real people linked to the company, relates the British daily The Guardian. The day before, FC Barcelona had broken an agreement with Ownix, a start-up linked to an Israeli businessman arrested for several cryptocurrency frauds.
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