Liverpool, Sorare team up for criptocurrency ties

Liverpool football club is extending a partnership with French sports startup Sorare in order to strengthen its ties with the world of criptocurrencies, according to a statement made by the company on Thursday.

The cards for the game are bought and traded in a form of non-fungible token, NFTs, a type of criptocurrency asset that records the ownership status of digital goods on the blockchain.

Sports-related collectibles proved to be a popular type of NFT as the digital assets market exploded into a multibillion-dollar industry last year, although the frenzy has cooled in recent months.

The average sale price of a Sorare NFT in August was $86.14, down from a March peak of $280 in March last year, according to market tracker CryptoSlam.

Britain's gambling watchdog is investigating Sorare's game to determine whether it is gambling. A spokesman for Sorare said that this was not relevant to the partnership with Liverpool.

Experts have confirmed that Sorare hasn't offered any form of gambling since the company was founded, as well as when signing new partnerships, and this has been confirmed by expert legal opinions at every stage since the company was founded, including when signing new partnerships.

Sorare says it has over 2 million users worldwide and has partnerships with more than 280 million sports organisations, including Major League Baseball in the United States and UK.