In keeping with the expectations of the country’s ardent soccer supporters, Argentina’s shocking 2-1 loss to Saudi Arabia in the FIFA World Cup opening match has caused the price of the Argentine Football Association Fan Token (ARG) to plunge.
Data from Coingecko shows that the ARG token, which was priced at $7.21 at kickoff, fell 31% to $4.96 by the game’s end due to the Lionel Messi-led soccer team’s dismal performance at the world cup.
The floor price of “The Saudis,” a collection of non-fungible tokens (NFT) with a Saudi Arabian theme and unconnected to the soccer team, soared by 52.6% from 0.196 Ether (ETH) to 0.3 ETH within the same period before falling to a price of 0.225 ETH, or about $250.
According to data from OpenSea, the collection’s sales volume increased by 990% over the previous 24 hours and is already approaching 24.5 ETH.
Despite the pre-existing excitement for the FIFA World Cup, which began on November 20, cryptocurrency research firm Delphi Digital observed that Chiliz (CHZ), the native token of the fan engagement platform Socios, along with other soccer-related tokens representing participating nations, has also significantly cooled off over the past few days:
On Socios, a fan engagement platform enabled by blockchain that has been one of the major drivers of the sports-fan token explosion, CHZ is a native ERC-20 token.
Socios, which has relationships with some of the biggest soccer clubs in the world, such as Barcelona F.C., Paris Saint-Germain F.C., and Manchester City F.C., powers many of the soccer-related tokens.
Although the tokens don’t represent ownership in teams, they do give buyers access to some benefits and the ability to vote on some decisions made by sponsored teams.
Fan-based tokens gain popularity
Sports-related fan-based tokens have become increasingly popular recently, with token sales volumes frequently rising by more than 250% month-over-month since January 2022.
Despite not being intended for betting on the performance of such teams, some people seem to have thought of the tokens in that way.
Other elements, such as the normal ups and downs of the cryptocurrency markets and breaking news stories, have an impact on the tokens in addition to the performance of soccer teams on the field.
As an illustration, consider how the recent FTX collapse caused the price of CHZ to drop by around 40% following news of the exchange’s liquidity problems and impending insolvency.
The first official blockchain-based sponsor of the FIFA World Cup, which will end on December 18, was the smart contract platform Algorand in May.
