- Title: Checkmate for Bitcoin? Chess tournament offers $100,000 crypto currency prize
- Date: 21st May 2021
- Summary: THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (MAY 20, 2021) (REUTERS VIA ZOOM) (SOUNDBITE) (English) DUTCH NUMBER ONE CHESS PLAYER, ANISH GIRI, SAYING: "For sure I know a lot of my friends and colleagues who are into this topic from very early on they are very much interested because obviously it is a a very exciting and new technology. Also, besides it being an exciting new technology is sort of an opportunity to sort of make some money if you are fortunate with your timings. I have read about it a lot it has been discussed a lot within the chess communities, also people sort of just they are quite used to doing their research, reading up about things, doing their homework and I think people who like that those who read up on these technologies are definitely quite excited about it." WHITE FLASH (SOUNDBITE) (English) DUTCH NUMBER ONE CHESS PLAYER, ANISH GIRI, SAYING: "There is a lot of volatility involved, a lot of uncertainty and I mean while everybody sort of agreed that the technology is really remarkable and pretty exciting, there's also a lot of experts of course are in agreement that they could very, very well be like the internet bubble, right? I mean the Internet still is a thing, but a lot of things were very much overvalued, a lot of bubbles and so on. So in that sense it's really nice to be playing for Bitcoin as a prize so it's like playing with the house money, right? You're getting it for pretty much for nothing, it's also a bonus added to the prize fund. So the prize fund is already there, and this is just the extra and that is really nice or the organisers and the sponsors to do that, so I am really looking forward."
- Embargoed: 4th June 2021 08:56
- Keywords: Anish Giri FTX Crypto Cup Magnus Carlsen bitcoin chess crypto currencies
- Location: VARIOUS LOCATIONS
- City: VARIOUS LOCATIONS
- Country: United Kingdom
- Topics: Chess,Europe,Sport
- Reuters ID: LVA00AEDWLAGV
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text:Crypto currencies may have had a turbulent week, but leading chess players - including world number one Magnus Carlsen - will play for $100,000 of Bitcoin over the coming days.
Together with a $220,000 cash pot, the FTX Crypto Cup, which begins on Sunday (May 23), has the biggest prize for an online chess competition in history.
Carlsen is the top name involved, but will joined by 15 of the world's leading players, including former world title challenger Fabiano Caruana, and the man who will take on the Norwegian next, Ian Nepomniachtchi.
Bitcoin was trading at nearly $60,000 at the start of May, plunged to below $35,000 this week but had recovered slightly on Friday (May 21) to around $40,000.
Hong Kong-based Sam Bankman-Fried, Chief Executive of crypto currency exchange FTX, admitted that the short term outlook for the crypto currency was uncertain, but that longer term it would become more established among mainstream financial institutions.
"I will say that there are certainly reasons to be optimistic, and one thing that I'll say is we've had conversations with a lot of major banks and other financial players over the last year, and one really, really consistent theme has been all of them saying 'well six months ago, we had a mandate basically never to touch crypto, and now we have a mandate that we have to figure out how to do something in crypto over the next two months'. And you know, I don't think they know what, or exactly what, you know how it's going to happen yet, and so there's still a lot of room left to grow that."
Meanwhile Dutch number one Anish Giri, who will be part of the line up at the FTX Crypto Cup, said interest in cryptocurrency among chess professionals was high, and welcomed the move to offer Bitcoin as prize money even if he couldn't be sure what it would be worth by the end of the tournament.
"It's like playing with the house money right?" he said. "You're getting it for pretty much for nothing, it's also a bonus added to the prize fund."
(Production: Iain Axon) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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