This is the week to end all weeks. There is no other week as...

This is the week to end all weeks. There is no other week as important as this week. And for the next four years there won’t be another week that means as much.

This is it. This is the final week of the FIFA World Cup.

By the time you read this we’ll already know one of the finalists —  England or Croatia.

If you’re from France,  England or Croatia this is basically life and death stuff.

Being in England right now I’ve (Drey) honestly never seen the country like this before. Never before has there been so much unity and happiness amongst the English.

We should note this is amidst the backdrop of a fractured government. This week two MPs resigned because of the current approach to Brexit. One being Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson.

Yet still while the government is in shambles, the country remains united. It’s phenomenal. And it’s reaching a climax.

If England makes the final, this country is going to go completely bonkers. If they lose to Croatia…well...it'll be mayhem. There may very well be riots in the streets.

To be honest, it’s quite something to be in a country making it deep into the final week of the world cup. The excitement is palatable. And the opportunity this suddenly presents is also quite extraordinary.

Beers and blockchain

Budweiser is a beer brand. It’s one of the world’s biggest and most popular beers. US$202 billion drinks company Anheuser-Busch InBev [NYSE:BUD] is Bud's parent company.

Budweiser — the brand, is also one of the major sponsors during the World Cup. You’ll see ‘Bud’ branding plastered everywhere. And during a month or so of football people are going to drink a lot of beer.

And a big chunk of that is Bud.

So it shouldn’t come as a huge surprise to see since the start of the World Cup Anheuser’s stock price has gone from US$97.30 to US$103.89.

That’s a 6.7% rise in a month.

Of course that’s not really too much to get crazy about is it?

But for a US$202 billion company, it’s significant. A 1% rise in stock price for Anheuser equates to US$2.02 billion.

Another 6.7% from here would see more than US$13 billion added to its market-cap.

At this point it’s a fair assumption on our part that you’re wondering why we’re talking about stocks like Anheuser in a crypto newsletter. Well there’s method to our madness.

You see on its own, Anheuser-Busch InBev is almost as large as the entire ‘market-cap’ of crypto.

If you popped on to coinmarketcap.com right now you’d see roughly a ‘market-cap’ of US$109,340.

Okay, it’s a fair bit bigger than Anheuser — but they’re both batting in the US$200 billion+ region.

This should give you some perspective as to how small the overall crypto world really is right now. In terms of fiat-converted value (crypto value priced in money like USD) it’s seriously tiny.

That’s why it’s important for you to understand how early days this all really is. But what wider crypto markets can do that a giant corporation like Anheuser can’t is move quickly.

And we expect that long-term, this point in time is going to seem laughable to you compared to where crypto markets will head.

A big part of the growth ahead does come down to awareness. The average person on the street may know about bitcoin, but chances are they don’t. And other crypto? No chance.

Ask a family member or friend to explain the benefits of decentralised energy market through Power Ledger? Or about ‘secret contracts’ that Enigma are developing? Or even how IOTA is working with the world’s major car companies to deliver the future of connected cars?

Most people have no idea about any of this.

But each one of these little crypto projects today has the chance to become as big as the likes of Anheuser InBev on their own.

The ‘World’s Game’ pushes crypto mainstream

Now think about when there are 100 crypto projects with the size and might of Anheuser InBev? That’s US$20 trillion right there.

Then add in hundreds, thousands of smaller projects worth millions to billion each. Quickly we’re talking about hundreds of trillions in global industry.

This kind of thing takes years to develop that kind of value, but in crypto it happens fast.

And we’re also starting to see crypto infiltrate the realm of ‘traditional’ companies like Anheuser. Obviously, Anheuser spent millions in sponsoring the World Cup.

This kind of spending has tangible return on investment for the company. And we’ve seen this with that 6.7% rise in their stock as one measurable metric.

But we’re now starting to see more crypto projects popping up in the world of sports sponsorship.

In January this year, Arsenal Football Club became the world’s first major sports team to seal a crypto sponsorship deal. The deal was with US based crypto project CashBet.

Arsenal is one of the world’s biggest football teams with millions of fans worldwide (in 2005 it was estimated their global fan base was 27 million).

And then just this week Wolverhampton Wanderers (Wolves) announced their own crypto-based sponsorship deal.

Crypto exchange CoinDeal will be the Wolves shirt sleeve sponsor over the 2018-19 season. This is again one of the world’s earliest deals seeing a cryptocurrency company sponsoring a major sports team.

Now the Wolves certainly don’t have the same global reach as Arsenal…yet.

But last year Chinese conglomerate, Fosun International bought the Wolves. This included a deal to broadcast games into China on Chinese pay-TV. It also included a huge spend to get players into the side.

And they won their way into promotion in the Premier League. Now across global TV networks the Wolves will be on full display with their Chinese owners at the helm…and CoinDeal sponsorship on their shirts and their grounds.

These are just some of the ways in which we’re seeing crypto edge its way into the mainstream. And it’s riding high on the back of football, the world’s biggest sport.

So next time you’re looking at coinmarketcap.com (which you will inevitably do) take these things into consideration.

Remember that the total ‘market-cap’ is barely bigger than just one big drinks company.

And remember that through the ‘World’s Game’ we’re starting to see crypto really hit the mainstream.

It’s still in its early days for FFG to but looking at the long game everything continues to point to a big future.