Super Bowl to drive Bitcoin above $50k? Here’s what past games suggest
Bitcoin price surged above $48,000 on Feb. 9 and again on Feb. 11. Historical market trends suggest Super Bowl LVIII will further intensify investor interest in BTC.
The affinity between Bitcoin and the National Football League (NFL) Super Bowl emerged in 2022 when companies like FTX and Coinbase placed landmark ad campaigns introducing cryptocurrencies to a teeming global audience.
Historical data trends suggest that with the corporate interest generated by the recent BTC spot ETF approval, Super Bowl 2024 could impact Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency’s prices.
Will BTC go up after Super Bowl 2024?
Bitcoin and cryptocurrency prices look set to witness significant price swings thanks to the Super Bowl 2024 event. According to official data from the NFL, approximately 200 million viewers — 60% of all people in the U.S. — watched the 2023 Super Bowl, making it the second most-watched sporting event in the world, behind the FIFA World Cup.
In 2022, Bitcoin made its big debut at the Super Bowl, with a retinue of crypto ads featuring A-list celebrities. FTX drew skepticism for its ad featuring the likes of Steph Curry, Naomi Osaka, Tom Brady and Larry David. Its 7.54 BTC giveaway worth $317,000 in market value also raised eyebrows.
Whether the growing spate of crypto ads during landmark sporting events has increased public interest in crypto is anyone’s guess. However, historical data shows that Bitcoin price has formed a conspicuous pattern around each Super Bowl event since 2022.
The chart below illustrates BTC price action and large investors’ trading activity before and after the last two Super Bowls.
The chart above shows a strikingly conspicuous pattern. In 2022, crypto whales entered a buying spree as crypto companies like FTX and Coinbase ran viral ads in the buildup to the main event.
In effect, BTC price rose 22% between the last week of January to the Super Bowl date on Feb. 13, 2022. Interestingly, the Bitcoin prices began to decline as the euphoria surrounding the event wore off. Between Feb. 15 and Feb. 23, 2023, BTC tanked 17%.
Ahead of the 2023 Super Bowl, this pattern reared its head again. Bitcoin price rallied 18% between Jan. 18, 2023, and the Feb. 13 Super Bowl date. This was also quickly followed by a 17% correction between Feb. 20 and March 10, 2023.
If this conspicuous historical pattern repeats, BTC holders can expect the 24% price rally from Jan 23 2024 to be followed by a pullback after the Super Bowl 2024.
Aside from price projections, betting and commercials are other major ways that the Super Bowl is expected to impact the cryptocurrency world.
Crypto commercials during Super Bowl 2024
Thanks to colorful half-time musical performances, the Super Bowl has become a big hit outside North America over the years, making it a holy grail for corporate entities jostling for coveted ad placements.
In 2022, FTX wasn’t the only crypto-related firm with a viral ad. Coinbase launched a 60-second ad featuring a floating and colorful QR code that directed the audience to a link offering $15 in Bitcoin to those who sign up for a Coinbase account before Feb. 15.
The ad proved so popular that the app eventually crashed.
Due to a biting crypto winter, crypto commercials were scarce during last year’s Super Bowl. That could change in 2024. With the recent approval of the Bitcoin spot ETFs in the U.S., public interest has grown even more.
Where to bet on the Super Bowl with Bitcoin?
Stake.com, Cloudbet, Rocketpot and Fairspin are among the more popular gambling platforms where users can place bets on this year’s Super Bowl using Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
Thanks to the proliferation of GambleFi, users can place bets using Bitcoin, altcoins or fiat through various forms of blockchain technology solutions.
The term GambleFi covers a wide range of decentralized gambling platforms from accepting cryptocurrency-denominated bets to leveraging smart contracts to ensure fairness, transparency, and security in the gambling industry.
According to user “cryptokoryo” on Dune analytics, the total number GambleFi users on the Arbitrum Layer-2 network has increased by an astonishing 2,200% between March 2023 and February 2024.
This figure could grow further if the Super Bowl further bolsters public interest in GambleFi.
What cryptocurrencies to buy after the Super Bowl?
According to an industry survey, an estimated $23.1 billion could be wagered on Super Bowl LVIII. That’s up from $16 billion last year.
And during big sporting events like the Super Bowl, Bitcoin and other large mega-cap Layer-1 cryptocurrencies like Ethereum (ETH), Ripple (XRP), Solana (SOL) often attract the most attention.
If the crypto GambleFi sector captures a fraction of this value, tokens like Casinocoin (CSC), WINk (WIN) and FUNToken (FUN) could be in for positive price action. See below.
In summary, historical data shows that Bitcoin has enjoyed a double-digit price rally in the weeks leading up to the last two Super Bowls, but subsequently entered a pullback.
A repeat of that pattern could see the BTC price drop well below $40,000 in the weeks ahead.
