Newcastle United and Cardiff City, the two cash-strapped English Premier League (EPL) teams, are reportedly in talks with a decentralised sports investment and funding platform SportyCo, to launch a cryptocurrency trading known as the Initial Coin Offering (ICO) round.
The partnership between the football teams and SportyCo would allow the clubs to initiate the sale of their private digitised tokens either as securities or utilities. Those who are interested to buy these aforementioned tokens would either obtain a particular stake in the clubs’ revenue or granted additional benefits for utilising the token on any game-related purchases.
Newcastle United is currently in a declining state of financial health as the club loses profits due to poor managerial decisions. In the meantime, Cardiff City is currently facing a huge debt totalling over $150 million, where the majority of it are owed to the Malaysian businessman and investment millionaire Tan Sri Vincent Tan. The Bluebirds has even went as far as deducting the wage bill to £20.6m, which is 18% lower than the year before.
Marko Filej, co-founder of SportyCo, is optimistic about the partnership with the football club. He said that money raised from the crowd sale will go straight into club infrastructure which will benefit the club forever. “With this initial money offer, we are opening a new chapter in football and the sports industry in general”, he added.
