Adverts promoting fan tokens from London’s celebrated football club Arsenal were banned after an investigation report. The UK advertising regulator rebuked Arsenal for blindly promoting their fan tokens without mentioning investment risks.
At the beginning of August, when the fan token launched, Arsenal’s official website promoted it as the following: “$AFC Fan Token: Everything you need to know.” A week later, another post appeared on Facebook: “What song do you want to hear when we win? Download the Socios app to get your token and vote.”
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) argued that Arsenal football club was irresponsible for taking advantage of fans, who are mostly inexperienced in crypto investments. ASA also investigated that the adverts were misleading, as the club didn’t inform about investment risks, and didn’t make clear the ‘token’ was a crypto asset.
“Clubs should not be allowed to use football's popularity to push an inherently high-risk product,”
Tim Payton, a board member of the Arsenal Supporters Trust told BBC.
