NFL cornerback Richard Sherman is a paid spokesperson for Cobinhood, a cryptocurrency exchange with no trading fees. But Sherman's involvement with cryptocurrency started years ago when he started accepting bitcoin for merchandise on his website. The following is a transcript of the video.
Sara Silverstein: This is not the first crypto project that you've been a part of or interest that you've had. How did you first get involved and when did that happen?
Richard Sherman: Well, honestly, and I hate telling this story because it's frustrating … So I have like a merchandise website, you know, shirts and sweaters and things like that for people who want to support. And early on, I mean maybe like five, six years ago, some of the fans were reaching out like "Oh, man, we want to pay in bitcoin. We're going to pay in this digital currency. And I was kind of skeptical obviously … normal cash will do. But one of our managers for our website was from Asia and he had heard of cryptocurrency and bitcoin and so he was more informed than I was and was like "Yeah, just go for it, just allow it. I think you're going to really this. I think it's the future." And so we allowed it. You know, for the most part, though, we just converted it back to cash, unfortunately. Um … yeah, so, you know, if I could go back in time and not convert that to cash then sure, I'd have a lot of bitcoin. Probably, millions of dollars.
Silverstein: But is that regret that got you interested and started to research bitcoin and get involved in the cryptocurrency?
Sherman: I mean, not really regret. Just kind of like a missed op. You know, like I passed on an opportunity where I could have done more research. I could have really looked into it and … But I've made some money. You know, I've made $15,000 on it, but, it could have been a lot more.