Premier League Replaces $459M NFT Deal Frozen by Crypto Winter

The crypto winter has hit the Premier League’s balance sheet.

The popular English soccer league signed a deal with blockchain company Sorare — replacing a more lucrative one with Consensys.

• Sorare will provide the Premier League’s NFT digital collectibles for $34.5 million annually.
• The league’s previous NFT deal with Consensys was for a reported total of $459.3 million. Consensys beat out Sorare, Dapper Labs, and Candy Digital for the contract.
• The Consensys deal fell apart in September amid falling cryptocurrency prices.

In September 2021, Sorare raised $680 million in a round led by Softbank that valued the company at $4.3 billion.

Sorare, best known for its blockchain-based fantasy soccer game, also has licensing deals with Serie A, La Liga, Bundesliga, and MLS.

Winter is Here

Leading cryptocurrencies bitcoin and ethereum each lost more than 60% of their value over the last 12 months. Other crypto assets have seen a similar plunge, with Luna and connected stablecoin TerraUSD collapsing in May and wiping out $40 billion in value.

In all, the crypto industry’s market cap has dropped from $3.2 trillion to under $1 trillion.

Dapper Labs’ NBA Top Shot, which helped ignite the NFT craze, has seen diminishing activity since topping $200 million in sales in both February and March of 2021, per Cryptoslam. 

This year, Top Shot has seen decreasing sales volume nearly every month since recording $59 million in January activity. In October, Top Shot earned $2.7 million in sales.