"Oh my God, it's so exciting, this is much more powerful than what I used to drive," this is Brad Pitt's experience of driving an F1 car for the first time, one of Hollywood's sexiest male stars.

In this month's cinema, Brad Pitt's "F1: The Movie" earned $56 million in its first week of North American release, with global box office breaking through $144 million, becoming the first true blockbuster in Apple's film history.

This nearly $300 million movie has attracted widespread attention not only for its IMAX on-site shooting and real team participation, but also caught the crypto community's eye. During the movie's promotion, Brad Pitt personally test-drove McLaren's 2023 season MCL60 race car, completing his first F1 driving experience.

And on Brad Pitt's racing suit and car, there was a logo that crypto enthusiasts are all too familiar with - OKX.

Since the FTX era in 2021, with FTX and Crypto.com leading the way, crypto exchanges have increasingly collaborated with top F1 teams after multi-season sponsorships.

Today, BlockBeats will count the crypto exchange "sponsors" who have sponsored F1 teams.

Which F1 teams have been sponsored by crypto "sponsors"?

FTX: Mercedes-AMG Petronas

In September 2021, FTX signed a multi-season sponsorship contract with Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 team, with the amount undisclosed.

FTX's logo was prominently displayed on the car's rear wing, cockpit edge, and even driver's cap.

At the time, FTX had been established for less than two years but had invested over $345 million in sports marketing. FTX's first collaboration with an F1 team was with Mercedes, a team that won the team and driver world championships consecutively from 2014 to 2020. FTX founder SBF believed this would further enhance FTX's trading platform status.

However, in November 2022, just a year later, FTX collapsed. Mercedes immediately announced the suspension of all cooperation, urgently removing FTX logos from race cars and related equipment before the Brazilian Grand Prix, and declared the end of this partnership. Many US media analyses pointed out that this case symbolizes the risks of F1's blind investment in the crypto market.

Mercedes' commercial director also publicly expressed caution about crypto sponsorships and subsequently maintained a more cautious attitude, keeping a considerable distance from any crypto institutions. Currently, Mercedes is one of the four teams in F1 that have not collaborated with any crypto platforms, along with Ferrari, Haas, and AlphaTauri.

The F1 race car previously driven by Brad Pitt is now in the office of OKX's Singapore headquarters.

Bybit: Oracle Red Bull Racing

In early 2022, the crypto trading platform Bybit announced a partnership with the top-tier Formula One team Oracle Red Bull Racing, which was then called the "largest single annual crypto investment" in international sports.

The three-year partnership was worth up to $150 million, with an average annual investment of around $50 million, directly ranking in the top five of F1 sponsorships that year.

Bybit's brand logo appeared in core positions on the Red Bull race car, such as the rear wing, front wing, and sidepods. The racing suits and helmets of drivers Verstappen and Perez also featured the Bybit logo. Bybit also participated in Red Bull Racing's business plans, including esports driver training.

This period coincided with Red Bull Racing's peak moment. From 2022 onwards, the team swept both the drivers' and constructors' championships for two consecutive years, with Verstappen breaking multiple F1 historical records and securing the throne of the "new generation champion". Bybit leveraged Red Bull's global influence to further expand its user growth in European and Asian markets. By the end of the 2024 season, Bybit announced it would not renew its contract with Red Bull Racing, and the partnership naturally expired.

Gate: Red Bull Racing

In 2025, marking its 12th anniversary, the veteran exchange platform Gate officially announced becoming the new official crypto trading platform partner of Red Bull Racing, succeeding Bybit as a sponsor of the top F1 team. The estimated investment for this cooperation agreement is also over $100 million, covering multiple seasons.

According to the cooperation details, from the 2025 season, the Gate brand will appear in the most core visual areas of Red Bull race cars, including the rear wing, headrest, chassis, team uniforms, and the side wing of four-time world champion Max Verstappen's helmet. The high-frequency brand logo exposure will provide strong support for Gate to gain higher global recognition.

After OKX and Bybit successively entered F1, Gate's entry is seen as part of a "brand upgrade" action, marking a further implementation of its international expansion strategy.

In such a field, "sponsorship" is not just a logo exposure, but a social entry ticket. It means you can walk into the pit area, obtain internal PR limited tickets, and directly communicate with drivers, management, or sponsors. These tickets are not sold externally and are only distributed to close friends, investors, and core partners. Many business deals, collaborations, and financing are born in such garages.

This explains why many crypto platforms are willing to spend tens of millions of dollars just to print their names on the side pods of McLaren, Red Bull, or Aston Martin cars—it's not an advertisement, it's an identity. More precisely, it's an "announcement" of identity: I am qualified to be part of this world.

From a resource perspective, F1 host locations are often global political and financial centers—Monaco, Singapore, Abu Dhabi, Las Vegas... Each race is a gathering place for political and business elites. Compared to the conversion rate of an advertisement, this "near-Davos-level" brand exposure is obviously more attractive to the crypto industry.

Therefore, even though top sponsorships can cost up to $50 million annually, crypto industry sponsors are still eager to participate.

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