The infamous Matt Damon, Fortune Favors the Brave advert for Crypto.com reached its first birthday this week. A Reddit user, u/gnarley_quinn, compiled a list of the significant Crypto.com advertising campaigns since the Matt Damon commercial launched in October 2021 and aligned it with the price of the native CRO token.
When the Matt Damon commercial first aired, the price of CRO was $0.21. Less than two weeks later, when Crypto.com announced its purchase of the naming rights to the Staples Center, it had increased to $0.35. By November 24, it had risen to just under a dollar to reach an all-time high of $0.97. Investors who bought on the day of the commercial and sold at the top made a return of 360%.
However, CRO has not broken a dollar as it has been in free fall since November 2021. The token followed the rest of the crypto industry as it declined throughout Q1 of 2022. When Crypto.com announced that it had pulled out of its Champion’s League sponsorship in February, CRO had already fallen 51% to just $0.47.
The token had fallen to $0.42 by March when the exchange announced it would sponsor the FIFA World Cup in 2022. The announcement failed to help invigorate the token’s value, and in May, it began reducing rewards for users of its Crypto.com rewards card. Rewards were slashed again in subsequent months, along with layoffs of over 200 employees.
While the price of the CRO token is not necessarily directly linked to the exchange’s success, it is undoubtedly an indication of public sentiment. The current price is around $0.11, which is a decline of 47%.
According to data from Coinpaprika, the trading volume on Crypto.com reached $3.8 billion in November 2021. Currently, the number sits at just $273 million, a decline of 93%. The exchange’s Estimated Real Volume, which removes wash trades, is estimated to be even lower at $160 million.
As u/gnarley_quinn highlighted, investing in Bitcoin when the Matt Damon commercial aired would have resulted in a loss of around 60%. Therefore, while the volatility of CRO has been high, the drawdown was 13% less than that of Bitcoin over the same period.
I constructed a timeline of significant events for Crypto .com since the release of that commercial. Here’s how the token has faired since that day. from CryptoCurrency