Socios.Com VISA Debit Card – I Am More Than A Fan
Redeem Offers & Rewards Linked To Favourite Clubs
Receive Cashback On Purchases & Other Incentives
Limited Edition Club Branded Cards To Come
Potential For Card To Serve As Ticket Entry
LONDON August 14th 2020: Chiliz (Binance:$CHZ), the leading blockchain fintech provider for sports and creators of the fan voting and rewards app Socios.com have announced the launch of the Socios.com VISA Debit Card. The card, which is powered by Railsbank’s pioneering open banking platform, will be available to all users on Socios.com.
Socios.com empowers users to ‘Be More Than A Fan’, allowing them to vote in club polls and earn rewards through digital assets known as Fan Tokens. Partners include FC Barcelona – who recently launched their $BAR Fan Token, generating $1.3M in sales revenue in less than 2 hours – Juventus, Paris Saint-Germain, Atlético de Madrid, AS Roma, Galatasaray, CA Independiente, UFC and esports team OG. As many as 50 more major sporting organisations are primed to join the platform in 2020, with four more clubs to launch Fan Tokens on August 25th. Details on which clubs will be joining the Socios.com roster will be revealed on August 18th.
The Socios.com VISA debit card will allow users to make deposits into their EUR or GBP wallet on Socios.com, topping up their balance and making payments for goods and services as with any traditional payments card. The card includes an IBAN and will initially be available in 26 countries in the European Economic Area, before expanding over time to additional markets.
Featuring the message ‘I AM MORE THAN A FAN’ on its overlay, the Socios.com VISA debit card will allow users to strengthen and increase their fan status, while also gaining access to a range of other benefits. In addition to the non-branded version of the card, exclusive limited-edition club-branded cards for the leading Fan Token holders, bestowing additional user privileges, will be created.
For every purchase made the card holder will be able to access financial rewards, club-related benefits and to increase their influence and status as a fan on Socios.com. The Socios.com VISA Debit Card will also allow the clubs to give more value to their sponsors, as it will create additional incentives for fans to make purchases.
For instance – a fan using the card to purchase the goods of an official club sponsor will receive cashback in the form of a Chiliz $CHZ deposit into their Socios.com account. Fans can use $CHZ – the leading digital currency for sports – to purchase additional Fan Tokens on Socios.com, allowing them to increase their voting weight in polls, boosting their fan status and chances of accessing unforgettable rewards and experiences. The fan will also receive an entry into that day’s $CHZ airdrop (with a winning value of over €100 equivalent) and leaderboard points that will further increase their chances of accessing club rewards. Fans could also receive similar rewards and incentives for making transactions within the stadium, or in sports bars or shops within 5km of the stadium on match days.
Examples of rewards include Juventus ($JUV) and AS Roma ($ASR) Fan Token holders appearing – via video – on the LED panels surrounding the pitch for recent home games. Galatasaray ($GAL) Fan Token holders also had their life-sized photos on display at the Türk Telekom stadium for the final three home games of the 2019/20 Süper Lig season.
Socios.com VISA Debit Card owners will also receive a unique global ID number linked to their KYC verified Socios.com ID, that will allow fans to redeem club and sponsor related rewards and discounts. The ID will be visible within the Socios.com app.
The card also has the potential to serve, in certain exclusive locations, as ticket entry to the stadium whereby the user’s phone and card becomes the ticket with ID secured by the Socios.com blockchain-based platform.
Users will have access to the Socios.com VISA Debit Card by the end of summer, with a roll out to follow during Q3 and beyond.
Alexandre Dreyfus, CEO & Founder of Chiliz and Socios.com added, “The Socios.com VISA debit card is the last mile between the club and its fans, through which fans can enjoy even greater recognition – receiving financial boosts and reward points while boosting their fan status for making purchases linked to the clubs they love.”
Louisa Murray, Global Head of Sales, Railsbank said: “Fintech and football together, the dream ticket! We are very excited that Chiliz and Socios.com have chosen the Railsbank platform from which to launch this very exciting product and we will be working very closely with the team to ensure that it is a great success.
“This is a great example of when we say, any company, or product, can be a fintech. It also illustrates how fintech can liberate so many aspects of life and be a key part in the development of society.”
Fans can apply for the Socios.com VISA debit card by filling in the application form, here.
ENDS
For Further Information:
Chiliz / Socios.com
Andrew Clarke – Global PR Manager
For more information please visit www.socios.com / www.chiliz.com
Notes to editor:
About Chiliz
Chiliz ($CHZ) is a digital currency for sports and entertainment platforms. It fuels the world’s first scalable, tokenized voting platform, Socios.com where fans can buy, trade and execute voting rights in their favorite sports teams. The Chiliz project has raised $66 million from some of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges and leading crypto funds in Asia, including Binance, OK Blockchain Capital, and Ceyuan Ventures. Chiliz is owned by Malta-based Mediarex Group, a global sports and entertainment organisation, which was founded in 2012. In January 2020, Chiliz announced the launch of Chiliz.net, a first-of-its-kind mobile and desktop crypto exchange for sports and entertainment assets.
About Socios.com
Socios.com helps sport entities achieve digital transformation through blockchain technology. Socios.com is powered by the Chiliz token ($CHZ), both an ERC20 utility token on the Ethereum blockchain and BEP-2 token on Binance Chain. Fan Tokens are specific to a team or a club, and are a finite, digital asset that provides access to an encrypted, immutable ledger of voting and membership rights ownership. The tokenized fan-voting platform uses Fan Tokens, which operate on a separate permissioned side chain. The Fan Tokens are limited in number, and are fungible, meaning their ownership can be traded, and their price is driven by the market. The venture was inspired by the fan-led management frameworks or ‘socios’ of some major football clubs. Dubbed ‘Socios 2.0’, the platform simply represents the digitisation of this model of management.
About Railsbank
Railsbank (www.railsbank.com) enables any business, or brand to be a fintech. The company is a pioneer and innovator in the Banking as a Platform (BaaP) and Financial Services as a Platform (FSaaP) sectors, defining the future of finance for consumers and SMEs.
Railsbank allows marketers, product managers, developers, CEOs and founders to rapidly prototype, launch and scale financial products using its open finance platform, operations, regulatory licensing and rich set of simple APIs. Railsbank’s APIs are the building blocks that enable customers to build pretty much any financial use-case they can imagine, meaning its customers can deliver delightful finance experiences to consumers and businesses.
It was founded by serial entrepreneurs, and fintech veterans Nigel Verdon and Clive Mitchell in 2016.
