Bad news: no crypto ads at this year’s Super Bowl. A noticeable change from last year’s National Football League championship, where cryptocurrency ads were so prevalent that the event was dubbed the “Crypto Bowl.”
Summary
No crypto ads at the Super Bowl: here’s why
According to broadcaster Fox Sports, there will be “zero representation” of cryptocurrency companies in the advertising lineup for this year’s Super Bowl championship game on Sunday.
Specifically, two cryptocurrency companies had ads “booked and ready” and two others were “on the 1-yard line,” said Mark Evans. Executive vice president of ad sales for Fox Sports, to the Associated Press . Following the collapse of cryptocurrency exchange FTX in November, the deals fell through, he added.
As anticipated, last year’s Super Bowl was so overrun with cryptocurrency ads, including Coinbase, Crypto.com and FTX, that it became known as the “Crypto Bowl.”
However, after a year of cryptocurrency price collapses and a wave of industry bankruptcies, as well as layoffs rather than expansion being the norm. This year’s event will see no such advertisements.
The National Football League’s Super Bowl championship game is watched annually by about 100 million viewers worldwide. Making it one of the most attractive business opportunities for companies. In 2022, according to MediaRadar, cryptocurrency companies spent a total of $54 million on Super Bowl advertising.
Spending for Super Bowls ads drained after crypto winter
Apparently, the cryptocurrency meltdown has left media companies with budget holes as advertising dries up. Through October 2022, crypto-related brands have shelled out $223 million in advertising in the US, up 150% from $89 million for the whole of last year, according to MediaRadar.
Few have been as aggressive as Crypto.com, which said that by the end of 2021 it was committing $100 million to an advertising campaign that would feature Matt Damon and be broadcast in 20 countries. The company was an official sponsor of the 2022 World Cup being held in Qatar.
However, what the cryptocurrency industry gives, it can take away. The extraordinary collapse of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX and its founder Sam Bankman-Fried‘s broader empire creates additional problems for advertising-supported media companies.
These companies had come to see cryptocurrencies as a new growth engine with money to burn. And FTX is not the only problem, as the contagion has been spreading for months.
For example, we know that Coinbase has lost over 80% of its value and the company cut 18% of its staff in June, when CEO Brian Armstrong admitted that the business was growing too fast and stressed “the need to manage expenses.”
Crypto.com reportedly cut 40% of its workforce, eToro downsized by 6% and in July cancelled a planned merger with a special purpose acquisition company, and BlockFi filed for bankruptcy.
Spending for ads by the cryptocurrency world
In the third quarter of 2022, major cryptocurrency advertisers spent only $35 million on ads, according to MediaRadar, an 80% drop from the first quarter, which received a huge boost from the single largest sporting event in the country: the Super Bowl.
The drop in spending, which is expected to intensify due to growing industry turmoil, is notable as advertising-based companies face broader challenges from rising inflation and fears of a recession.
But while crypto represented a promising area for growth, it still constitutes a small part of the overall advertising market.
Companies as a whole are expected to spend nearly $89 billion on TV advertising this year, via linear programming and connected devices, and nearly $250 billion on digital ads, according to Insider Intelligence.
In addition, Facebook (including Instagram), Twitter and TikTok together are expected to raise $57.1 million in advertising from cryptocurrency exchanges this year, according to SensorTower. This is roughly even with the 2021 figures, although almost all of last year’s spending was on Facebook and Instagram.
Then, the Super Bowl created a spending spree the industry may never see again. A 30-second spot during the NFL grand finale in February cost an average of $6.5 million, and cryptocurrencies were a huge theme.
Coinbase, Crypto.com, eToro and FTX spent a combined $54 million on Super Bowl ads, according to MediaRadar. Coinbase aired a 60-second commercial, which showed a bouncing QR code that, when scanned, led to a promotion which was offering $15 of free Bitcoin to new users.
FTX signed Larry David to an ad, urging viewers not to miss out on cryptocurrencies and declaring NFTs “the next big thing.” A version of “Fly Me to the Moon” played during the eToro commercial.
