Source: Media Scroll
Source: Washington Business Daily
The 2022 World Cup in Qatar is also fueling the concept of virtual currencies. On November 23, the Argentinian Football Association fan token ARG coin trading price fluctuated greatly. On the evening of November 22, Argentina lost to Saudi Arabia 1-2 in the first group match, ARG coin fell by 40% during the day. The official fan token SNFT in Spain, which will kick off at midnight on November 24, is also in a downward trend.
Washington Business Daily reporter found that since the second half of 2022, the World Cup-related news has been heated up, and the World Cup-related virtual currencies have also become hot. As token prices fluctuate, virtual currency exchanges are increasing user engagement through World Cup-related events. In the heat of the World Cup, virtual currencies are also partying. But it’s also worth noting that Chinese soccer fans should avoid virtual currency transactions as there are so many virtual currencies riding the World Cup craze.
Fan tokens have skyrocketed and plummeted
Famous soccer player Lionel Messi led Argentina to a stunning defeat in the World Cup at the hands of Saudi Arabia. On November 23, Saudi Arabia had a day off to celebrate the victory. At the same time, with the Argentina team’s first defeat, the ARG currency trading price is also constantly fluctuating.
ARG coins also traded sharply higher before the World Cup, peaking near $9. Then it fell for days. On November 22, the ARG opened at $6.4027 and rose as high as $7.1416. The ARG currency fell as much as 40 percent to as low as $3.8235 after Argentina’s loss. ARG eventually recovered to near $5.50, paring losses to 15%.
On November 23, ARG currency continued its volatile trend. As of 17:05 on November 23, ARG was trading at $5.69, down 21.9% in the last 24 hours.
According to CoinGecko, the ARG fan token is the fan token of the Argentine Football Association. Virtual currency fan tokens are digital assets issued to fans by a team’s official operator, and their holders receive fan benefits such as voting on club decisions, rewards, merchandise designs and unique experiences. Related virtual currencies can also be resold in the secondary market.
In addition to Argentina, Brazil, Spain and Portugal have released their official fan tokens, namely BFT, SNFT and POR. Among them, Spain will usher in the group match with Costa Rica at midnight on November 24, SNFT currency trend is not outstanding, but a small decline, 24 hours down 2.7%, at $0.3303.
It’s important to note that fan tokens, including ARG and SNFT, have been on a roller coaster ride lately. Since the opening of the World Cup, the World Cup football concept tokens overall in the downward trend. CoinGecko shows that as of 17:05 on November 23, the world’s largest World Cup concept coin, CHZ, was trading at $0.185, up 4.7% in the last 24 hours and down 17.4% in the last 7 days. BFT was trading at $0.6346, down 16.6 percent in the last 24 hours and 21.7 percent in the last 7 days.
In the view of Su Xiaorui, a senior consultant in the financial industry of Analytics, the results of sports events are inherently uncertain, so the price of tokens associated with team ranking and game results will naturally be affected by the reality. This behavior is similar to “betting on football”, and the risk of external market fluctuations is extremely high. In addition, fans may suffer losses due to the trading platform’s routine operation.
Wang Peng, a researcher at Washington Academy of Social Sciences and Renmin University of China’s Intelligent Society Governance Research Center, further analyzed that even the official tokens issued by teams and associations are still essentially the same as virtual currencies, that is, there is no underlying asset support, lack a series of rules and central governance structure. Combined with the performance of the team on the field of play, this kind of virtual currency is also prone to chase the rise and fall, rise and fall.
The exchange took advantage of the heat to pull new
As the quadrennial sporting event gets off to an unprecedented start, not only is the rise and fall of the relevant virtual currencies attracting widespread attention, some virtual currency exchanges are also taking advantage of the World Cup fever, launching various events around the game, and promoters are working hard to attract new players.
For example, Auyi platform, formerly one of the three major currency exchanges in China, launched the World Cup Trading Competition and set up a dynamic prize pool for the Qatar World Cup. Registration for the event began on November 15, and the official competition will be held from November 29 to December 19. The participating users need to form a team and make individual ranking and team ranking according to the rate of return and trading volume. The top 10 users can share the prize pool.
According to the competition details, to split the prize pool, users need to meet entry requirements. The total assets of the account should exceed 100 USDT before the match, the cumulative trading volume should exceed 10,000 USDT, and the equity of the trading account during the match should exceed the specified requirements, etc.
At the same time, during the opening of the World Cup, in addition to the aforementioned trading matches, there are other activities such as “Dividing prize pool with NFT Competition” and “earning coins with high interest to get user NFT” on the OYI platform. The winners and losers of the game can guess, and those who guess correctly can win additional reward multiplier to increase the return rate, and at the same time, they can also get the corresponding team’s OYI World Cup NFT.
In addition to the activities of Ouyi platform, on November 23, a reporter from Washington Business Daily also noticed that some users engaged in exchange promotion have recently published the activities of a virtual currency exchange named WEEX. According to the page, WEEX platform launched the “World Cup call Game”. Users can fill in the form to support their favorite team during the corresponding game, and complete a contract transaction on the day of the game. They can share the high deduction prize pool of 10,000 USDT, and the prize pool of the final is 30,000 USDT. However, the deduction is used to offset the 20% contract transaction commission.
Measured by a reporter from Washington Business Daily, domestic users can also participate in the corresponding activities after downloading and registering on the corresponding platform through the download channel that bypasses the app store. Regarding the main purpose and effectiveness of relevant activities launched by the platform, and why domestic users can also participate in the activities, the reporter also asked AUI for information. WEEX failed to obtain corresponding contact information.
Oyi responded that the relevant activity was a contest held by OYI during the World Cup, with the main purpose of letting more users understand and experience NFT. All NFT earned by users will be free of charge, and the rewards will be provided by OYI. Aui also stood by its previous statement that it was not targeting the Chinese mainland market. The activity does not involve the transaction of crypto assets, but we also hope that participating users can participate in this on-chain activity under the premise of complying with local laws and regulations.
However, another person working in the exchange told Washington Business Daily that the activities launched by the virtual currency exchange around the World Cup are mainly to promote the promotion of new users and traffic with the help of the World Cup heat, and improve user participation.
Su pointed out that due to the lack of reliable credit endorsement, how to attract investors to do large scale has become a key link for virtual currency exchanges to maintain their business. The currency circle “hot spot” is a common basic operation, aiming at attracting investors with the help of market hot spots. There are still risks, of course, and investors could easily be cut off.
Investors are advised to stay away
In recent years, virtual currency elements have frequently appeared in various sporting events. In this World Cup, the advertisement of Crypto.com, an official sponsor of Qatar World Cup, appeared on the guardrail of the football stadium. Argentina’s national team shirts with the crypto exchange Binance’s English name and LOGO… Even earlier, several football clubs have used virtual currency to pay their staff.
But for trading users, the hidden risks also have to guard against. In addition to the official fan tokens issued by some national soccer team operators, almost every national team has unofficial fan tokens, with some organizations endorsing the virtual currency in the name of the official team.
For example, the FRA, widely believed to be the official release of the French Football Federation, was exposed in October to fake players’ photos and videos by means of face changing and Photoshop, and packaging itself as a fan token issued by the official issue of the French Football Federation. According to CoinGecko, the FRA surged 123.4 percent in the 24 hours to 17:05 on Nov. 23, but it is still down 46.2 percent in the last 30 days.
Not only that, but betting scams around virtual currencies have been widely highlighted recently. During the 2018 World Cup, police in Maoming, Guangdong Province, cracked a major case of online gambling using bitcoin. Criminals used online platforms to open casinos and attract a large number of fans to bet on football.
Even overseas exchanges are not allowed to directly carry out such betting activities, the exchange official told Washington Business Today.
It should also be noted that virtual currency trading has been completely banned in our country. On November 22, at the parallel forum “Governance System and Financial Stability” of the Financial Street Forum 2022 annual meeting, Huang Hui, deputy director general of the Department of Management and Inspection of the State Administration of Foreign Exchange proposed to jointly promote the regulation of virtual currency into laws and regulations and strengthen the governance of virtual currency transactions.
Virtual currency-related activities around popular events such as the World Cup also need to guard against risks. Su stressed that virtual currency trading has been banned in China. Investors are advised to stay away from both the so-called “formal” and “mainstream” virtual currencies and altcoins.
Wang Peng pointed out that under the heat of the World Cup, it is inevitable that some people use the heat to do illegal things. In the field of virtual currency, users should view virtual currency rationally, strictly comply with regulatory requirements, and avoid being attracted by high risks to participate in it and eventually cause their own losses. At the same time, we should also learn to identify the scams in the name of virtual currency and the World Cup and be vigilant.
Washington Business Daily Financial Investigation Group
Report/Feedback
