Messi leaves Argentina team: What is his legacy in crypto?

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Messi leaves Argentina team

Why did crypto want Messi?

The simplest answer is reach. Messi has hundreds of millions of social media followers and a level of global recognition that few companies could reproduce through conventional advertising.

That was particularly valuable during crypto's rapid expansion into sports. Exchanges sponsored teams and stadiums, blockchain companies signed athletes, while fan tokens and NFTs promised supporters new ways to interact with their favorite players and clubs.

Messi became one of the biggest names in that strategy. In 2022, he signed a three-year agreement reportedly worth more than $20 million to become a global ambassador for Socios.com, the blockchain platform behind fan tokens for numerous football clubs and national teams. Later that year, he partnered with crypto exchange Bitget and also joined Sorare, the blockchain-based fantasy sports platform, as an investor and ambassador.

The attraction of football has not disappeared. Crypto.com remains a global sponsor of the UEFA Champions League, WhiteBIT extended its FC Barcelona partnership for another five years in 2026, while exchanges including BingX and Bitget continue to invest in major football partnerships. Messi's deals came during an earlier surge in crypto sports marketing, but the industry's willingness to pay for football's global audience clearly survived it.

One celebrity, very different crypto products

Let’s take a closer look at the crypto projects Messi became the face of. We’ll start with Socios, which positioned fan tokens as a new way for clubs to engage with their supporters. Holders could participate in selected polls, access rewards and potentially gain experiences linked to their teams. Messi's move to Paris Saint-Germain in 2021 even included a payment in PSG fan tokens as part of his signing package.

Sorare offered something different. Its digital player cards can be collected and traded, but they are also used to build fantasy teams whose results depend on players' real-world performances. The company says it has more than 3 million users across 180 markets and partnerships with more than 300 teams, leagues and sporting organizations.

Bitget was closer to conventional advertising, using Messi as an instantly recognizable face for an exchange competing in a crowded international market. WATER took celebrity attention somewhere more speculative. In 2024, Messi promoted the Solana-based memecoin on Instagram, exposing it to an enormous audience and sending its price sharply higher before much of the increase disappeared. Unlike an exchange or game with a product people could continue using, WATER depended much more directly on the attention generated by the post itself.

Did star power actually work?

That depends on what success means. For an exchange, the calculation is relatively conventional: a company pays for global recognition, and an athlete supplies it. Bitget did not need Messi's followers to become professional traders overnight for the partnership to increase awareness of its brand.

Tokens are different because attention can directly affect their price. Argentina's ARG fan token climbed 23% immediately before the 2022 World Cup final as excitement around Messi and the national team peaked. Argentina then beat France and Messi finally lifted the World Cup, yet ARG fell 47% after the match.

The contradiction illustrates one of the problems with turning fandom into a financial asset. A sporting victory can generate enormous emotional value without creating any lasting reason for a token's market value to rise. By May 2026, ARG was trading around 91% below its 2022 peak, while Barcelona's BAR and PSG's token were around 98% to 99% below their respective highs.

When fame itself becomes the product

There is another side to the relationship between Messi and crypto: he does not necessarily need to participate at all. Various tokens using his name and image have appeared without evidence that he created or endorsed them, while major moments in his career provide ready-made narratives around which speculative assets can emerge.

That distinction matters. A token called MESSI is not automatically a “Messi cryptocurrency,” just as using the footballer's photograph or name does not establish a commercial relationship with him. Yet once attention itself becomes valuable, a World Cup final, transfer or retirement can rapidly become material for a new token.

Social media has made that relationship even more immediate. Major sponsorship agreements and ambassador deals still exist, but memecoin markets can turn a single post or cultural moment into trading activity almost instantly. Celebrity is no longer always advertising the product; sometimes the attention surrounding the celebrity becomes part of what is being traded.

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