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Giannis Antetokounmpo # 34 of the Milwaukee Bucks leads to the basket against Bam Adebayo # 13 of the Miami Heat during the second half at American Airlines Arena on March 02, 2020 in Miami, Florida.
Michael Reaves | Getty Images
A city trying to rebrand itself as the center of the crypto world may soon have a cryptocurrency exchange on the stadium of its NBA franchise.
FTX won the naming rights to the entertainment venue currently known as American Airlines Arena, home to the Miami Heat. The deal, approved by the Miami-Dade County Board of Commissioners Friday, is $ 135 million over 19 years.
The NBA has yet to approve the deal before it becomes official, FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried said in an email. The NBA did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The Heat declined to comment.
The company is now part of a long and sometimes eventful history of companies holding naming rights for stadiums. Some brands are becoming synonymous with their franchises, such as Gillette and the New England Patriots or Staples Center and the Los Angeles Lakers.
For other companies, however, the naming rights served as billboards reminding the public of their struggles. The Sports Authority had to give up its sponsorship of the NFL’s Broncos Stadium after it went bankrupt in 2016.
Enron was famous for having the rights to MLB’s Houston Astros Stadium before an accounting scandal brought the company down. And in Oklahoma City, Chesapeake Energy’s branding is still present in the basketball arena for the NBA Thunder, even after the company filed for bankruptcy last year.
The dot-com era two decades ago provides even more fodder for naming rights gone awry. Tech company CMGI was the original sponsor of what would become Gillette Stadium, but had to cut that deal after its stock was put into storage, according to a CNN report at the time. The now defunct Adelphia and PSINet also owned the naming rights to NFL stadiums around the turn of the century.
Politicians and business leaders in the Miami area have worked over the past year to make the company a welcoming environment for tech and crypto companies. Francis Suarez, the mayor of the city of Miami, told CNBC last month that Miami “is positioning itself as one of the most tech-savvy cities in America” and announced that city employees can choose to be paid by bitcoin.
Many commissioners and Miami-Dade County mayor Daniella Levine Cava welcomed the deal that funds from the deal could be used for initiatives to reduce poverty and gun violence. A few of the commissioners, including Rebeca Sosa, raised concerns over attribution of the rights to a young company that has a limited US presence, but the deal was passed by an overwhelming majority.
FTX is an international cryptocurrency exchange that does not operate in the United States and has more products than its counterpart, FTX US. Bankman-Fried said the two were separate companies and that he was the majority shareholder in both.
The Miami Heat has been one of the most successful NBA franchises in recent years, appearing in 5 NBA Finals since 2010 and winning two titles.
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