The FTX crypto derivatives exchange has listed a new futures contract on its platform. The contract is coined “OLY2021,” and essentially allows investors to bet on the probability of the 2021 Tokyo Olympic Games taking place this year.
The premise for the creation of this futures contract is the high uncertainty that surrounds the possibility of the Olympics games occurring this year.
This uncertainty is of course driven by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, especially considering the drastic rise of Coronavirus cases in Japan reported more than a month ago.
FTX Opens the Door to Olympic Speculation
The terms of the futures contract state that OLY2021 tokens will expire at $1 if the Olympics take place in 2021. Conversely, they go to $0 if the Olympics are canceled or postponed for the remainder of the year.
FTX defines that the event has taken place if the official Olympics results page is updated to reflect at least 15 medals awarded to participants in any sports included in the Tokyo Olympic Games.
FTX has not mentioned a location clause in its official terms. The Olympics could almost certainly not be moved to any other location due to the enormous preliminary arrangements that need to be made for the event to run smoothly.
Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) Gets Creative
The chief executive officer (CEO) of FTX is Sam Bankman-Fried, also known as “SBF.” Along with this role in FTX, he is CEO of Alameda Research and leads Project Serum, a decentralized finance (DeFi) derivatives exchange.
SBF was recently featured by Forbes in its 30 under 30 list in December 2020. In February, he was featured in the second-place spot in its Wealthiest People in Crypto report. He reportedly has a net worth of $4.5 billion, putting him just slightly behind Brian Armstrong, the CEO of Coinbase.
In a similar product launch, FTX listed the Trump 2024 futures contract earlier this month. This contract was launched under the ticker “TRUMP2024” with the main clause being that, “TRUMP2024 expires to $1 if Donald Trump wins the 2024 US presidential general election.”
In yet another innovative launch, FTX announced in November last year that it would be introducing tokenized trading for US stocks. This enables FTX users to trade in stocks like Amazon, Facebook, Netflix, and other popular tech stocks.
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