GMO Coin Becomes the Official Sponsor of a Japanese Baseball Team

GMO Coin, the cryptocurrency arm of the Japanese giant GMO Internet, has announced today that it is the official sponsor of the Japanese baseball team, the Chiba Lotte Marines.

Baseball is one of Japan’s largest sports and the Chiba Lotte Marines are a well-known team in the country. They have won the Japan Series Championship, the top baseball league in the country, four times. The teams most recent victory was in 2010.

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However, the Chiba Lotte Marines have struggled as a team this season. In the Pacific League, they are coming second last, just in front of the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles.

According to the statement, the sponsorship will allow GMO Coin to contribute towards the baseball team’s development and future.

Sports sponsorships

Japan has one of the friendliest environments for cryptocurrencies. In 2016, the country officially recognized bitcoin and digital currencies as a “means of payment that is not a legal currency.” This partnership with the Marines will allow GMO Coin to increase its brand awareness.

Sports sponsorships are becoming increasingly common for cryptocurrency brokers. This is because sponsorships with sporting teams is an enticing way to raise brand awareness for the FX, CFDs, binary options, and cryptocurrency industries.

In Europe, there has been a definite increase in cryptocurrency sponsorships. Earlier this year, CashBet launched a strategic partnership with Premier League football club Arsenal FC.

GMO Coin

GMO Coin was established in October 2016 and offers investors the opportunity to trade virtual currencies. Earlier this year, GMO expanded the reach of its crypto trading platform internationally by entering the UK market. To achieve that, the UK arm of the GMO Internet’s brokerage arm (‘Z.com Trade’ and GMO Click Securities respectively) signed a deal with Finatext UK, a company which sells various financial technology services.

In May, the Japanese internet giant also introduced a mobile-based crypto wallet platform on iOS called “GMO Coin Virtual Currency Wallet.” This allows customers to store multiple cryptocurrencies along with fiat.

According to the statement, GMO Coin aims to be the safest virtual currency exchange agent in the world and will continue to contribute to the development of the virtual currency industry.