ESL FACEIT Group’s enters partnership with CS skins trading site white.market

ESL FACEIT Group has expanded its dominance of the esports market as it announces a new partnership with skins trading platform white.market. News of the strategic partnership was announced on Tuesday, Jan. 30 by release and social post, where both ESL FACEIT Group and white.market hyped the new collaboration.

As part of the partnership, ESL FACEIT Group will bring new rewards to players using the FACEIT platform, including Counter-Strike skins, FACEIT premium subscriptions, cash deposits, and exclusive discounts on the white.market platform. This cross-promotion will benefit both users of the FACEIT tournament platform, and skin traders on white.market.

Beyond this, white.market looks to extend its reach from the digital space into the real world as it joins ESL FACEIT group for several event activations. These include ESL Pro Tour live events, including EPT Championship, EPT Masters, and EPT Challengers, and an official partnership launch at Intel Extreme Masters Katowice 2024, which runs from Jan. 31 to Feb. 11.

Today, (Jan. 31) white.market’s website began featuring a new FACEIT link which allows players to connect their white.market account to FACEIT. As per the website, traders who link their white.market account with FACEIT will be able to participate in missions and events from white.market and FACEIT, get drops and tickets for completing these missions, and earn rewards.

Oleksandr Shapoval, CEO of white.market, shared his excitement for the start of the partnership:

“ESL FACEIT Group and white.market are united by the love of Counter-Strike. Our mutual goal is to contribute to the community and to build a platform that creates a unique gaming experience for all. We have a vision to create more than the ordinary marketplace, and we welcome EFG to participate in this journey.”

“We are looking forward to the start of IEM Katowice 2024, for which we prepared several innovative activities and competitions. And it’s only the beginning… GO RUSH B with us!”

Currently, the partnership is only in effect within Europe and Latin America, due to limits on skin trading. The release also outlined that the partnership extends only across ESL Counter-Strike 2 Pro Tour.

As per the release, the new partnership with white.market has evolved from a previous collaboration between the cryptocurrency exchange WhiteBIT and FACEIT. That partnership culminated in a Community Clash event, which culminated in finals at DreamHack Valencia, with a $1 million prize pool awarded in Tether, a cryptocurrency tied to the USD. The WhiteBIT development team later went on to create white.market.

Earlier this year, tournament organizer and ESL competitor BLAST Premier also announced a partnership with skins trading site TradeIt.gg. That partnership will similarly see TradeIt.gg collaborate with BLAST for the entire 2024 season, starting with BLAST Spring Groups.

ESL FACEIT Group is a part of Savvy Games Group, a subsidiary of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, PIF, and is the largest esports tournament operator in the world. Their IEM Extreme Masters Katowice event in February will be the latest in over a decade of esports events within the city.

White.market is a peer-to-peer skins trading platform that facilitates fund withdrawals in multiple national and cryptocurrencies. It’s one of the most advanced and popular CS2 skins markets around, and uses real money for the trading.

Michael Hassall
Michael Hassall

Since: January 31, 2024

Michael has worked in the esports industry for five years after a brief career in marketing. A professional writer for almost a decade, and a lifelong gamer, writing about esports is his one true passion, when he’s not glued to a screen playing the games he writes about.

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