Aston, Alfa Romeo first F1 teams to launch fan tokens

The two F1 teams will join football clubs like FC Barcelona, Manchester City, Paris Saint-Germain, Juventus and AC Milan in offering fan tokens through the Chiliz blockchain.

The fan tokens can be brought by fans, and offer their owners the chance to take part in voting decisions, earn VIP rewards or get involved in exclusive promotions. The tokens can also be traded on the crypto markets.

Aston Martin's commercial director Jefferson Slack said: "We're proud to be joining an exclusive roster of global sporting properties all working in partnership with Socios.com. This really gives us the best possible opportunity to give our fans a seat at the table and help us to tell our story in a new and exciting way."

Alfa Romeo team principal Fred Vasseur added: "The world of fan engagement in F1 is evolving and Alfa Romeo Racing ORLEN is at the forefront of this exciting new realm.

"Launching a fan token is going to provide our growing legion of fans with a new way to interact with the team, which is a key aspect in our quest to bring our followers closer to the team with everything we do."

As well as offering fans a chance to integrate more with their favourite teams, the tokens offer a good revenue streams for those squads that sign up.

Teams get a percentage commission of each token sold, plus a share of trading fees that are generated from the buying and selling of the tokens on either big exchanges like Binance or with the Chiliz crypto platform.

Socios and Chilz CEO Alexandre Dreyfus told Motorsport.com earlier this year: "In 2020, as a company, we sold more than $30 million of tokens for all of our partners. And because more or less we were on a 50/50 basis, it means that the clubs generated more than $15 million in total.

"There are some clubs that got more than $5 million each, which, in the COVID-19 world, is very good fresh money, and very much welcome for them."

In total, fan tokens have generated more than $150 million in revenues for those teams and organisations involved.

Last week, Socios.com announced its first motor racing tie-up with NASCAR's Roush Fenway Racing.

Dreyfus believed the arrival of F1 fan tokens on the back of their growth in other sports, heralded a new digital era.

"In the next few years a generation of passive fans will shift into active fans," he said.

"That transition will take place through transactional fan engagement on our platform.

"The biggest global sporting organisations are joining us en masse. Socios.com and Fan Tokens are here to stay and will become essential tools in the digital transformation of the sports industry."