(Bloomberg) — NBA superstar Steph Curry, who recently entered into a partnership with the fast-growing digital-asset exchange FTX, said he wants to use cryptocurrencies as a socially conscious platform.
The two-time most valuable player spoke with Bloomberg’s Emily Chang at a charity event for his Eat. Learn. Play. foundation. Football great Tom Brady and model Gisele Bündchen also signed their own deal with FTX earlier this year.
FTX, which was valued at $18 billion in its most recent round of fundraising, has announced a number of sports-related deals and partnerships in recent months. The Cal Golden Bears signed a 10-year, $17.5 million naming rights deal with the company just last month. In addition, the NBA’s Miami Heat play in FTX Arena and the company is also the official crypto exchange of Major League Baseball.
A condensed version of the interview with the Golden State Warriors basketball guard follows.
You caused a bit of a stir this week taking to Twitter saying you’re getting into crypto and you wanted some help. And some people think that crypto could actually open up economic opportunity for underserved communities. I’m curious what excites you about crypto?
I think we’re obviously at the beginning. I know it’s been around for a while, but from a mass awareness perspective, understanding how this is going to be a part of the next generation and how they think about financial opportunity and access to that.
And right now, it’s just about education. I think in terms of what it actually is, how it can be leveraged in the proper ways. I’m curious about it. I’m involved in it. And understand there is a big community right now that is excited about what this will mean for democratizing financial institutions and how we do things. So it’s about educating the next generation.
This is going to be around. This is going to be something that you can participate in. And hopefully we can create that access to opportunity through it and do it in a fun way too because it is kind of overwhelming when you think about a lot of the questions that people have about what is it actually doing.
Tom Brady told you not to laser eye. You changed your avatar to a Bored Ape, nod to NFTs -– what’s up with that?
You’ve got to have fun with it. When we both signed up with FTX and there was a little dip in here and there, and four hours after he had a launch, it’s very similar to what I did. But it’s a volatile kind of market right now. But the long-term prospects are very positive. And the biggest thing about what Tom is doing you know, what I’m trying to do, with that partnership specifically is to create a socially conscious platform within crypto.
The founder of FTX, he’s very committed to that, setting a standard for what it means to be socially responsible within the success of the crypto, and I can get behind that as well.
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