The other day there was a “momento histórico” in football and the crypto industry. The first player transfer paid with USDC.
Giuliano Galoppo, a football player from the Argentinean club Banfield, became the first player in the history of football whose transfer to another team (São Paulo FC) was paid with the use of a stablecoin, specifically USDC. The buying club will make a deal thanks to an agreement with the Mexican platform Bitso.
Bitso is a cryptocurrency exchange founded in Mexico in 2014 by Ben Peters, Pablo Gonzalez and Daniel Vogel. The product is positioned as a simple and secure platform for trading and storing cryptocurrency. At the moment, 35 cryptocurrencies are represented on the platform, and the number of users exceeds five million.
Thales Freitas — CEO of Bitso’s Brazilian department gave an interview to La Nacion newspaper, in which he called Giuliano Galoppo’s transfer “momento histórico”. Also, Thales Freitas stated that Bitso is proud to be working with football clubs on this deal.
“Our main mission is to contribute to greater modernization, digitization and inclusion, and this is another important step in that direction. We are very proud to work with the two clubs to make this historic signing of São Paulo possible, with all the security, transparency and flexibility that the crypto economy offers.” (original Spanish text here)
The amount that Giuliano Galoppo cost the São Paulo club is not disclosed. But, according to La Nacion, the player has been valued at eight million dollars.
Dante Disparte — chief strategy officer and head of global policy in Circle — said that the deal would be beneficial for FC Banfield, as it would reduce the currency risk. But, sources from Banco Central de la República Argentina told CoinDesk that Banfield FC will be required to convert all the money received from São Paulo into Argentine pesos at the official exchange rate.
It would be more profitable to change the USDC to the peso, since the exchange rate in the exchangers is higher than the official dollar-to-peso exchange rate. But, since the São Paulo football club is a major sports figure, they cannot exchange through dubious exchangers.
This transaction is undoubtedly an important historical event for both the crypto industry and football. And we continue to observe.
