Cryptocurrency in sport: a thematic review

TL;DR

This paper reviews how cryptocurrencies and blockchain are being used in sports, focusing on fan tokens and their financial, social, and ethical impacts.

Contribution

The study provides a structured thematic analysis of cryptocurrency-related research in sports, identifying five key research strands.

Findings

Five recurring research themes were identified, including financial aspects of fan tokens and their market sensitivity.

Blockchain applications in sports are linked to governance issues and ethical concerns about transparency and power imbalances.

The study highlights risks similar to gambling, including addiction and harmful consumption patterns among users.

Abstract

Blockchain-enabled products (e.g., cryptocurrencies and fan tokens) have rapidly expanded across professional sport, but the research landscape remains dispersed across finance, marketing, information systems, and sport management.

This study conducted a thematic review of Web of Science Core Collection records supplemented by snowball searching, yielding 30 English-language peer-reviewed studies published between 2019 and 2025.

Based on the included titles, we mapped how the literature has developed and what it collectively implies for sport organizations, platforms, and consumers. Five recurring strands were identified: (1) fan tokens and sport cryptoassets as financial assets, emphasizing volatility, spillovers, and sensitivity to sport- and crypto-market events; (2) adoption, identity, and engagement research explaining why supporters buy/hold tokens, participate in voting, and engage in advocacy; (3) computational and platform-data approaches (e.g., sentiment/discourse analyses and poll/voting participation patterns) to quantify online engagement and market narratives; (4) blockchain applications and governance, including stakeholder-oriented discussions and ethical critiques regarding value creation, transparency, and power asymmetries; and (5) gambling-like risks and addiction-related correlates, highlighting the convergence of trading, betting-like dynamics, and potentially harmful consumption.

Limitations include dependence on WoS-indexed English-language publications, topic and context concentration (especially European football and major platforms), and heterogeneity in study designs and outcomes that precludes comprehensive data synthesis. Future research should broaden contexts beyond dominant sports/regions and use stronger longitudinal or quasi-experimental designs to test mechanisms and harms.

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