Philippines Crypto Wallet Service Provider Coins.ph Partners With the PBA – FTX, Crypto.com, Grayscale Investments, and Blockchain.com, among other well-known digital currency companies, have integrated themselves into the sports world through various partnerships and endeavors over the previous year. Coins.ph, a regulated fiat and crypto service provider, announced a partnership with the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) on June 3.
Following the National Basketball Association, the PBA was founded in 1975 and is the world’s second-oldest professional basketball league. The Philippine Cup is the most prominent tournament in the PBA season, and it is made up of 12 franchised teams.
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Fans will be able to experience the full-arena experience for the first time since 2019 at the upcoming 2022 Philippine Cup. The company’s “brand presence would be featured throughout the Philippine Cup,” according to Coins.ph’s announcement.
Coins.ph intends to engage fans by providing interactive experiences and spreading cryptocurrency awareness. During the 2022 PBA season, PBA fans will be able to win cryptocurrencies, and Coins.ph will be highlighted in television ads.
“Basketball is incredibly important in Filipino culture, which makes it a great match for Coins.ph, a proudly homegrown fintech business in the Philippines,” said Wei Zhou, CEO of Coins.ph, in a statement. Zhou went on to say that the firm has witnessed an increase in interest in Web3 and digital currencies in recent months, and that the PBA’s prominence can help raise crypto awareness.
Zhou continued:
“In the Philippines, we’ve witnessed an increase in Web3 engagement, and we feel that more Filipinos are joining the crypto community. The PBA is an excellent platform for educating Filipinos about the crypto-economy, and we are grateful for the opportunity to broaden crypto market adoption.”
Coins.ph was founded in 2014 and has raised around $40 million in capital funding, with the most recent Series C investment led by Ribbit Capital at $30 million. Aside from the PBA partnership, Coins.ph and Xendit executives launched a non-fungible token (NFT) platform with $2 million in seed funding.
Coins.ph was previously owned by Gojek, an Indonesian digital company that paid $95 million for the company. Several regional investors associated with Gojek and Coins.ph verified that the company was purchased by Wei Zhou, the former CFO of Binance, according to a report published by Ka Kay Lum, the deputy editor and business journalist at the-ken.com’s SEA edition.
Celebrity athletes and the sports industry have been used by crypto enterprises to gain more visibility in the recent year. For example, FTX obtained the name of the Miami Heat’s arena, while Crypto.com obtained the Los Angeles Lakers’ arena.
Several well-known athletes, like Tom Brady, LeBron James, Francis Ngannou, and Kevin Durant, have partnered with cryptocurrency companies. Willie O. Marcial, the league commissioner of the Philippine Basketball Association, feels the partnership with Coins.ph will help the PBA develop.
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“The PBA is Asia’s first professional basketball league and is now a national institution,” Marcial said during the announcement of the partnership. “When it comes to professional sports entertainment, it’s still unparalleled.” And working with Coins.ph would undoubtedly help the PBA improve and strengthen its reputation as one of the greatest leagues in the region. “Furthermore, the PBA is all about improvement and growth. Coins.ph will allow fans to participate in a new way while also learning more about the cryptocurrency community.”
