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- Crypto Super Bowl ads are not what they used to be.
- New York increases DCG lawsuit to $3 billion.
- Bitcoin miner industry groups troubled by energy data collection.
Crypto to have low profile on Super Bowl TV
Super Bowl LVIII will feature a dearth of crypto ads on TV, despite the $1.7 trillion digital assets market being stronger than last year, when it was mired in the depths of crypto winter, Fox Business reported.
When the San Francisco 49ers and the Kansas City Chiefs clash in Las Vegas on Sunday, providing the biggest television marketing opportunity of the year, most major crypto companies will sit it out because they don’t have the extra cash for advertising or prefer to spend their money elsewhere.
Kraken, the second-biggest US crypto exchange, will not be advertising. “The Super Bowl is a very US-centric event, and the next wave of crypto users will come from all around the world, not just the United States,” Mayur Gupta, the firm’s chief marketing officer, told Fox Business.
Coinbase, the biggest US crypto exchange, is putting its cash and attention into lobbying Congress for crypto legislation and contributing to crypto-friendly politicians in the run-up to elections later this year. Although Coinbase has been a Super Bowl advertiser in the past, it is unclear whether it will be on Sunday, the report said.
Spot Bitcoin ETF issuers probably won’t be making a splash either, even though some launched TV commercials before their January 10 approval by the Securities and Exchange Commission. BlackRock and Grayscale, for example, will not advertise during the game, Fox Business said, citing unidentified people. The report noted that most of the Super Bowl ad slots had been sold out by early November, more than two months before the ETFs were approved.
FTX paid $6.5 million to advertise during the 2022 Super Bowl, but entered bankruptcy before the year was out as the market turned bearish.
Still, Super Bowl ads this Sunday will feature celebrities galore and plenty of spots touting beer and wine, according to a report by Axios.
New York triples lawsuit against DCG to $3 billion
New York Attorney General Letitia James filed an amended complaint tripling the amount of her lawsuit against Digital Currency Group and other defendants to more than $3 billion, according to a statement from her office.
James initially sued DCG, Genesis Global Capital, and Gemini Trust in October, claiming that they misled investors about the Gemini Earn investment program, causing more than $1 billion in losses.
The attorney general’s office said further investigation had revealed that additional investors were similarly misled, “provided with false assurances that their funds were safe when in fact they were not.”
DCG said the lawsuit was “baseless” and that it expects to win in court. “DCG has always conducted its business lawfully and with integrity, and DCG and Barry Silbert will be fully vindicated,” it said in a statement cited by Reuters.
Crypto miner energy data collection called abuse of power
A survey of energy use by Bitcoin miners in the US mandated by the Energy Department is “a politically motivated campaign against Bitcoin mining, cryptocurrency, and US-led innovation,” according to a statement by Lee Bratcher, president of the Texas Blockchain Council, and Perianne Boring, CEO of the Chamber of Digital Commerce.
This comes after the Energy Information Administration said last week that electricity demand from crypto miners had grown rapidly over the last several years to as much as 2.3% of US consumption, and that it would collect mandatory data from the miners in the first part of this year for planning and education purposes.
The industry groups’ statement said the data collection was an “abuse of authority” by the government and should cause alarm for all industries that use data centres as part of their operations.
Crypto market movers
- Bitcoin is down 0.23% today at $47,104.70.
- Ethereum is down 0.23% today at $2,486.32.