The British Gambling Commission has initiated an investigation into Sorare’s fantasy football NFT-platform. The regulator notes this on its website.
According to the regulator’s statement, the company does not hold a licence to operate in the region — British consumers were urged to take this into account when deciding whether to use the service.
“This means that any actions taken on the site by users in the United Kingdom fall outside the rules that a licensed operator must follow,” the Commission noted.
The regulator plans to determine whether Sorare has features of a gambling platform.
Representatives of the service said they were ready to engage with authorities and expressed confidence that they do not offer users “any form of regulated gambling.”
“This has been confirmed by lawyers at all stages since the company’s founding, including during several rounds of funding,” the statement says.
Sorare was founded in 2018. The platform allows buying, selling and exchanging NFT cards of players from leading football clubs worldwide. The tokens are also used in virtual prize tournaments.
Among Sorare’s 175 partner clubs are the French «Paris Saint-Germain», Italian Juventus, Spanish Barcelona, Russian Spartak, and «Zenit».
According to the company, the platform has more than 600,000 registered users. Since the start of 2021, trading volume has surpassed $150 million.
In February, Sorare raised $50 million. The funding round was led by venture capital firm Benchmark.
In September, the NFT platform closed a Series B financing round for $680 million. The company’s valuation stood at $4.3 billion.
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