Infantino Wants FIFA to Have Its Own Cryptocurrency. Should It?

FIFA President Gianni Infantino is pushing ahead with plans to launch a “FIFA Coin” and “FIFA Token,” pitching the idea as a way to reach the sport’s estimated five billion fans worldwide. It could be one of the biggest mainstream crypto adoption plays ever attempted, but it needs to be done right.

From the White House to Mar-a-Lago

The idea first surfaced publicly at the White House Crypto Summit in March 2025, where Infantino stood alongside President Trump and openly solicited partners. Trump called the hypothetical coin “quite a coin” and suggested it could end up being worth more than FIFA itself.

Since then, the project has reportedly deepened. According to Sky Sports, Infantino has continued developing the concept at a private event at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, with links to the Trump family’s World Liberty Financial operation. The pitch? A potential global currency for six billion football fans, launched from the United States ahead of the 2026 World Cup.

Breaking: As of today, TUDN reports that Infantino and FIFA are actively preparing to create their own cryptocurrency ahead of the 2026 World Cup, with Donald Jr. and Eric Trump closely involved in the project through World Liberty Financial TUDN.

If this actually ships, it would represent the single largest potential onboarding event in crypto history. No other organisation on earth has FIFA’s global reach.

The Market Is Already Paying Attention

Within hours of Infantino’s original White House remarks, an unaffiliated token calling itself “FIFA COIN” surged by 142,000%, reaching a market cap of approximately $3 million TheStreet. Other similarly named tokens saw a 357,000% daily price increase, hitting a market capitalization of approximately $8.2 million Bitget. None of these had any connection to FIFA, which tells you two things: demand for a legitimate FIFA token is clearly there, but the lack of an official product is leaving a vacuum that scammers and speculators are happy to fill. The sooner FIFA delivers something real, the better for everyone.

Lessons From Football’s Blockchain Experiments So Far

FIFA isn’t new to blockchain. Its “Right-to-Buy” NFT tokens for the 2026 World Cup, developed with partner Modex, let fans secure guaranteed ticket access through tokenised purchases. Tens of thousands of tokens have already been sold, earning FIFA an estimated $15 million Swissinfo, which shows genuine consumer appetite for blockchain-based fan products.

That said, the model hasn’t been without friction. Switzerland’s gambling authority Gespa has opened a preliminary investigation to determine whether the tokens constitute a form of gambling under Swiss law Blockworks, since tickets are conditional on team qualification. It’s a regulatory grey area that FIFA will need to navigate carefully, and a reminder that execution matters as much as ambition.

Earlier fan token efforts across football have been mixed. UEFA’s partnership with Socios drew criticism from supporter groups who felt it monetized engagement through largely unregulated crypto products Wdtimes. The lesson here isn’t that fan tokens are a bad idea. It’s that they need to deliver genuine utility, not just speculative upside.

The Real Opportunity (and What FIFA Should Avoid)

The scale of opportunity here is enormous. Blockchain-based ticketing, cross-border payments between federations and clubs, transparent governance, fan rewards with real utility. Football is a $170 billion global industry with notoriously clunky infrastructure. Crypto can genuinely fix parts of that.

As the Sporting Crypto newsletter argued, FIFA doesn’t necessarily need its own tradeable token for borderless payments or member support, and could leverage existing blockchain standards Sporting Crypto. But there’s a counter-argument: a native FIFA token with real utility baked into the ecosystem (ticketing, merchandise, fan voting, staking for exclusive access) could create something far more powerful than bolting crypto onto existing rails. The key is building it as a utility token with genuine use cases, not a speculative memecoin.

Infantino admitted at the summit that he’s “not an expert at all” in crypto. That’s actually fine, as long as the right partners are building the infrastructure. And the Trump family’s involvement through World Liberty Financial, whatever your politics, does signal serious institutional backing.

The Bigger Picture

The timing makes strategic sense. The 2026 World Cup across the US, Mexico and Canada is projected to generate $11 billion for FIFA. The Trump administration has positioned the US as the most crypto-friendly jurisdiction in the world. Infantino has met with Trump four times in the early months of 2025 alone, including at the inauguration, the Super Bowl, the FII Priority Summit and the Crypto Summit Inside World Football. The political and regulatory winds are favourable.

If FIFA builds a genuine utility token with real-world use cases tied to the biggest sporting event on earth, it could be transformative for mainstream crypto adoption. Five billion potential users is not a number any other project can claim.

But it has to be done properly. Real utility. Clear regulation. Actual fan benefit. Not just hype.

The crypto industry has been waiting for a true global consumer use case. FIFA might just be it.