Alternative sports organization Fan Controlled Football (FCF) has raised $40 million in Series A funding from crypto and blockchain gaming firms to support the league’s expansion plans, including four new teams and an NFT project. The FCF was founded in 2017 by Sohrob Farudi, Patrick Dees, Ray Austin and Grant Cohen and hosted its debut season inside a bubble environment in Atlanta amid the pandemic last year. The FCF features an indoor version of American football in a seven vs seven-player format, and the games are streamed live on Twitch. The unique feature of the league is that the teams …

Mike Tyson is living the $DREAM Boxing icon Mike Tyson has stepped into the ring this week, after he shared his enthusiasm for Solana and unveiled a partnership with mental health-focused crypto project TheDreamChain ($DREAM). In the first round, Tyson — who previously launched an NFT project on Ethereum via OpenSea last year — tweeted on Jan. 13 that he was a born-again Solana (SOL) proponent while sharing a screenshot of a new NFT he'd snapped up from the Catalina Whale Mixer project. The Solana-based Catalina Whale Mixer NFTs currently have a floor price of 15 SOL ($2,200), and Tyson’s …

On Monday afternoon, Andre Iguodala, three-time NBA champion and the professional basketball player for the Golden State Warriors, announced via Twitter that he would be taking a portion of his estimated $2.647 million annual salary in Bitcoin (BTC). In addition, Iguodala added that he will give out $1 million worth in BTC to fans to increase the digital currency's adoption. Payments were said to be facilitated by Block's (formerly Square) Cash App. I’m excited to announce I’m taking part of my salary in BITCOIN w. Cash App! Bitcoin is the future, @klaythompson and I are both believers. To make bitcoin …

BTC Markets, the largest digital assets exchange in Australia, has announced it will be sponsoring professional tennis player Ajla Tomljanovic for the Australian Open and Sydney Tennis Classic tournaments taking place this month. In a Tuesday announcement, BTC Markets said it would be backing Tomljanovic as part of a partnership inspired in part by “increased investor activity from female investors in the last financial year.” Users from the crypto exchange will have the chance to win tickets to the tournaments and a meeting with the tennis star with a nonfungible token showing proof of attendance. Flash Competition to win 2 …

2021 was an exciting year for crypto, with several well-known — some unexpected — brands entering the crypto sector. Here’s looking at you, Charmin, and your toilet paper nonfungible tokens (NFTs). The year saw its fair share of moments that had crypto enthusiasts on the edge of their seats. While many people continued to talk generally about the revolutionary power of cryptocurrencies and blockchain, it seems as though 2021 was the year when the ideas underlying these technologies truly took hold of the consciousness of the mainstream. From NFTs to Web3, there has never been more interest expressed from traditional …

Though the crypto space has seemingly moved beyond the endorsements many minor celebrities bestowed on token projects during the 2018 initial coin offering boom, its growing popularity and acceptance now has professional sports players, Hollywood elites and politicians backing major companies dealing with digital assets. In June 2021, Kim Kardashian promoted EthereumMax (EMAX) via an Instagram story shared with her more than 200 million followers. The token, which was used as payment for online ticket purchases for some pay-per-view events, gained 116,000% in just one week following the celebrity’s activity before falling more than 99% and leaving many investors in …

No sector of the economy or indeed life is safe from nonfungible tokens (NFTs) or tokenization. Golf is the latest sport to succumb to the lure of NFTs and a round of decentralization thanks to the efforts of LinksDAO. In a sold-out NFT drop, LinksDAO raised $10.5 million to fund its golfing aspirations. More than 9,000 “leisure membership” and “global membership” NFTs were purchased on the OpenSea platform, exchanged for Ether (ETH). It would seem that while 2021 was a thriving year of decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) activity, with some treasuries surging in value by 40x, golf is also now …

Cryptocurrencies and sport have continued to collide in 2021 with synergies between the two proving to be fruitful on a number of fronts. The relationship between the sports world and the various applications of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology has slowly been expanding over the past few years. Humble beginnings of simple sponsorships building early brand awareness for exchanges and payment platforms have snowballed into worldwide recognition and collaboration between the sectors, with 2021 seeing a variety of different use cases come to the fore. From the basketball courts of the NBA to the soccer fields of Europe, crypto continues to …

Kevin Lee, a professional mixed martial arts fighter, has said a major factor in his decision to sign with a new promotion company was Bitcoin (BTC). According to a report from MMA news outlet BJ Penn, the Russia-based Eagle Fighting Championship will be paying Lee in BTC as part of a four-fight contract. The fighter has reportedly been a HODLer since before the 2017 bull run, later using some of the profits to live off of after paying for knee surgeries. “To be paid in Bitcoin and not give me any pushback on it whatsoever, was huge in the decision …

Italian luxury sports car manufacturer Ferrari is moving into the blockchain industry by inking a partnership with Swiss blockchain startup Velas Network. Ferrari officially announced Monday that it signed a multi-year agreement with Velas to jointly issue “exclusive digital content” for the Scuderia’s fans. Velas will also be the main sponsor for Ferrari Esports Series, the online series competing in the F1 Esports Series, the official digital championship including all teams participating in the FIA Formula 1 World Championship. The announcement describes Velas as a major company in the industry of digital assets and blockchain, emphasizing the startup’s focus on …

For NFL fans, 2021 was a great year. Stadiums returned to capacity crowds after the 2020 season was shortened with limited attendance. Stadium parking lots were again filled with the enthusiastic anticipation of tailgaters and their barbequed camaraderie. It was also a great year for Bitcoin (BTC) investors as the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization reached all-time high prices multiple times throughout 2021, eventually topping out at $69,000 in early November. This led to a dramatic increase in media coverage of Bitcoin. Seven NFL players in 2021 decided to call the audible and begin either being paid in crypto or …

In his monthly crypto tech column, Israeli serial entrepreneur Ariel Shapira covers emerging technologies within the crypto, decentralized finance (DeFi) and blockchain space, as well as their roles in shaping the economy of the 21st century. When trying to examine the nonfungible token (NFT) economy as it has been shaping in recent months, two main trends can be discerned. On the one hand, a completely new market that allows various artists to join a new creator economy — the creators of Bored Ape Yacht Club, various types of pixel art creators and creative flickers such as the creator of long-necked …