Bitcoin springs up as winners’ prize cash in sports like chess, football entering crypto space. The world’s most prominent chess players, headed by world champion Magnus Carlsen, are in line for a big bitcoin bonus if they can win subsequent week’s FTX Crypto Cup.
In days to arrive, the world’s best chess players, accompanied by world champion Magnus Carlsen, are expected to follow the highly volatile cryptocurrency market closely.
Understandably so, as the winner of next week’s FTX Crypto Cup, the $320,000 prize wealth richest-ever online chess tournament that will recognise the Top 10 ranked players take on every other, has been guaranteed a large Bitcoin bonus.
You may open an account to get crypto profits, and get richer.
This fantastic windfall notwithstanding, the ever-fluctuating bitcoin value was $100,000 on May 17 when the tournament was announced. Subsequently, everyone saw a 30 per cent slump had scored a shade of intrigue and possibility about real prize money up for grasps.
The principally insular sporting system has been heating up to the decentralised digital currency. Over the last some years, bitcoins have found mention in records of English League footballers and NBA stars. Cricketers, too, are shifting with time. For example, former Australian cricketer Brett Lee donated one bitcoin (approximately Rs 40 lakh at the time) for COVID philanthropy in India. Around the corresponding time, ICC revealed that former Zimbabwean cricketer Heath Streak had admitted to accepting bitcoin cash from a bookie.
Andreas Thome, the Play Magnus Group CEO, describes the Crypto Cup as a path-breaking event. “We, along with several chess players around the world, have been regarding cryptocurrencies for many years and are enthusiastic about celebrating this fast-growing business,” he remarks on the tournament site.
The tournament sponsor and cryptocurrency exchange, Sam Bankman-Fried, the chief executive of FTX, spoke to Reuters about the connection chess has with digital currency. “In several ways, you know the chess demographic overlaps a fair bit with the cryptocurrency demographic in terms of people who tend to be technologically sophisticated, younger and quantitative. So I think you understand while crypto’s appeal is broadening quite a little, you know that it still does continue the demographic that is most agreeable to it,” he said. Dutch
Grandmaster Anish Giri explained chess.com: “It’s like working with the house money, right? You’re making it for notable nothing. It’s a bonus combined with the prize fund. So it’s a good idea. It’s here to stay. I don’t own an account, but I’m thinking to get one soon.”
Another exciting facet of the tournament is the live layout of the fluctuating bitcoin price on the tournament website, providing the players and the fans an opinion about the continually changing bonus for the winner.
When the tournament was published on May 17, the organisers had acquired 2.1825 bitcoin worth $100,000 at $45,000. But two days after, the market crashed after Chinese regulators banned banks and payment firms from accepting cryptocurrencies.
It plunged by approximately 30 per cent to roughly $30,000, though in three days, it resuscitated to around $40,000. But what counts would be its value on May 31, the last day of the tournament. They could end up bagging prize money more minor than the projected $100,000.
Among the leading advocates of cryptocurrency is past world winner Garry Kasparov. “Anything that can allow us the opportunity to get back control or some control of our solitude is always welcome. It’s a reply to the shift of power from to states or other organisations that may act on our privacy without our permission,” he said with a disclaimer. As with any new technology, it’s not intrinsically good or bad. It depends on who’s utilising it and for what purpose. For example, you can use nuclear technology to create a bomb or a reactor.”
A day after the release, Chess.com propelled its crypto-related chess game – CryptoChamps Chess, a tournament starring largely amateur stars. These additions are a further sign of sports increasingly welcoming Bitcoins, the world’s most successful digital currency. But, of course, it’s not cryptocurrency stage FTX’s first foray into sport either: It hacked up $135 million to acquire the naming rights to the home stadium of the NBA’s Miami Heat.
The bitcoins are augmenting in currency in the realm of sports. English Premier League team Southampton had made it known that there is an “option for the club to be paid certain performance-based bonuses in Bitcoin at the end of each season, allowing the club the opportunity to take advantage of the new, high-growth currency if it feels it will bring significant future benefits”. There is a bitcoin logo on the sleeves of Watford, another club the betting firm sponsors. Watford became one of the prime football clubs in the world to allow digital currency.
In Spain, last January, when Segunda B side DUX Internacional de Madrid acquired signature for an undisclosed sum, former Real Madrid graduate and Levante striker David Barral became the first to be purchased using cryptocurrency solely. Three years ago, Gibraltar United FC had stated that they’d be paying their players using crypto.
With transfer amounts skyrocketing by the day, Bitcoin transactions will become more prevalent in a not-so-distant future. Iqbal V. Gandham, UK managing administrator at eToro, a cryptocurrency stage with ties with many EPL clubs, told The Sun in January that “within about six to twelve months we will notice a player transfer in the Premier League; achieved using bitcoin.” It could support clubs to avoid issues throughout the third-party ownership of players, which occurs in many high-profile transfers.
Though it’s an unforeseeable subsequent season, football authorities are not opposed to the idea. There is more agreement in FIFA and UEFA, with a return for matches in the 2018 World Cup accepted through cryptocurrency. FIFA had then said that it sees the mode as safe and transparent without the worry of black marketing.