»After the demise of FTX, the Miami Heat’s arena is given a temporary moniker«
The home arena of the Miami Heat is now known as Miami-Dade Arena.
This will be the temporary name of the arena where the NBA franchise plays its home games until a more permanent naming-rights partner is found.
The new name was unveiled by the Heat and Miami-Dade County on Friday, two days after a bankruptcy court cancelled the county’s naming rights agreement with the defunct cryptocurrency exchange FTX.
Earlier in the week, a county official stated that it will be referred to as “the Arena,” but these plans swiftly changed.
“Effective immediately, Miami-Dade County and the Miami Heat have agreed to refer to the arena as Miami-Dade Arena until a new naming rights partner is found,” the parties stated in a joint statement. In the following weeks, the facility’s current signage will be removed and replaced with new branding elements.
The removal of all FTX branding from the venue will take considerable time.
The company’s logo appears on the court, on numerous entrances, embroidered on the shirts of many security and in-game personnel, on the roof of the arena, and even on the swipe cards that employees use to enter the facility.
In November, the county requested that the name rights agreement be terminated, stating that continuing to refer to the building as FTX Arena would only exacerbate the “enduring hardships” caused by the collapse of the bitcoin exchange.
The county owns the arena and secured a $135 million, 19-year naming rights agreement with FTX.
The Heat, who have played in the arena since January 2, 2000, were to get $2 million per year under the terms of this agreement, which went into effect in June 2021. The county and the Heat have stated that they will collaborate to identify a new naming partner.
Prior to the FTX agreement, the building had been known as AmericanAirlines Arena since its 1999 opening.
The airline company, which has a hub in Miami, said in 2019 that it would not extend its contract beyond January 1, 2020. The structure retained the airline’s name until 2021.
FTX was the third-largest cryptocurrency exchange, but it suffered billions of dollars in losses — estimates range from $8 billion to $10 billion — before filing for bankruptcy following a dramatic meltdown that lasted only days.
Its founder, Sam Bankman-Fried, 30, was arrested in the Bahamas last month and extradited to the United States to face criminal charges in what U.S. Attorney Damian Williams termed “one of the largest frauds in American history.”
Bankman-Fried has been released on bond, and his trial is planned for October. He entered a not-guilty plea.
»After the demise of FTX, the Miami Heat’s arena is given a temporary moniker«