Super Bowl gambling has a locked-in loser: advertisers

Will she or won’t she? That’s the multimillion-dollar question. [Bloomberg]( This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, an iPhone-toting punter of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. On Sundays, we look at the major themes of the week past and how they will define the week ahead. Sign up for the daily newsletter [here](. [Supersonic]( Will she or won’t she? That’s the multimillion-dollar question for this Super Bowl Sunday. You know who “she” is, of course. The [“will or won’t”]( might surprise you: Will Taylor Swift “cry if the Kansas City Chiefs lose to the San Francisco 49ers?” To get a sense of the millions involved, I suppose you could check out BetOnline.ag; I don’t have the heart. It’s not that I bother to decry the commercialization or celebrification of the Big Game or the NFL or big-time sports — I’m not an idiot. (Nor am I simply bitter because my team melted down against the Niners in the Divisional Round.) But to a sports fan, the silly prop bets — on who will win the coin toss or whether the score will be tied at the half or what color Gatorade will get dumped on whom — rankle. It’s like the difference between smugly reading [“The Big Short”]( and discovering your home is wrapped up in a mortgage-backed security. Lionel Laurent takes a more dispassionate — i.e., French — [view of the whole thing](: “Welcome to the tip of a global [gambling iceberg](, as cash-strapped governments everywhere find it harder to resist the lure of an increasingly gamified, tech-savvy industry that brings in precious tax revenue — $1.6 billion in two years for the state of New York alone,” he writes. “Europe’s gambling operators last year [called on]( France — one of only two EU markets that still bans online casinos — to legalize them to ‘secure vital tax revenues.’ ” Given that BetOnline is based in Panama, I’m not sure who secures the revenues on whether Taylor wears red, black or white (excluding any jacket!). I even struggle to shed alligator tears over the “real victims”: “Today’s iPhone-toting punters may be a world away from the portrayal of Paul Newman’s broken-thumbed hustler Fast Eddie, but the risk of addiction is rising among young men (and it is [mostly]( [men]() who don’t even need to get dressed or leave the house to place a bet,” writes Lionel. Then again, my judgment is pretty questionable, as I’m the guy who bought an [“ownership”]( stake in an NFL team that is worth exactly as much as the paper it’s printed on.[1](#footnote-1) Am I the only one who thinks the ads are a sucker’s game as well? Yes, some of the ludicrously expensive spots achieve iconic status. Ridley Scott’s [1984 Macintosh commercial](, for instance, is embedded in the brains of all Gen Xers, although I question whether a peroxided roid-monster smashing Big Brother with a sledgehammer moved anybody to shell out $2,495 in mid-1980s dollars for 128K RAM. But for Kyla Scanlon, the weirdness was only beginning, and may peak today with DoorDash “breaking our brains” by [dishing out]( every product flogged during the game to one person. (Personally, I think anyone who truly wants [all this junk]( should be saddled with an actual Budweiser horse, and not just its saddle — “There’s got to be Clydesdale in here somewhere!”) But perhaps the advertisers are wising up: Kyla points out, in a new [Bloomberg Opinion video](, that State Farm stopped airing $7 million spots on the actual game last year, opting to push the [newer, cooler Jake]( on TikTok alone — for 245 million views. “Commercials matter,” Kyla notes, “but social engagement matters more … they’re competing against everything for the attention economy.” Watch: [Super Bowl Commercials Are Too Weird Now]( Anheuser-Busch seems mostly to have been competing against itself lately. It’s tempting to see last spring’s media meltdown as tanking Bud Light pretty much on its own, but market forces had been at work for a while. “With younger people increasingly turning to spirits, brewers need beer to appeal to a broader, more youthful audience,” Andrea Felsted [writes](. So it’s basically throwing everything up against the wall to see what sticks: Peyton Manning, a genie, somebody called Dana White, 80s metal hair, a T-Rex, Steppenwolf and ... a what’s-your-sign joke!? Perhaps they’re going after the kids through their grandparents. “The so-called ‘Megabrew’ will need more than wizardry to move on from the backlash sparked by the partnership last year with transgender influencer and actor Dylan Mulvaney,” Andrea writes. “This is still causing a hangover, and even the expense and razzamatazz of the Super Bowl is unlikely to revive the brand. Investors are hoping Donald Trump might, though, after his support for Bud Light sent its parent’s shares up the most since the end of October.” Trump vs. Mulvaney —another sucker’s bet. Bonus Celebrification Reading: - The Grammys Aside, [Music Is Still]( a Man’s World — Bobby Ghosh - Tyla Shows There’s [More to African Music]( Than Afrobeats — Bobby Ghosh - Brazil [Should Resist the NFL’s Dreams]( of Global Domination — JP Spinetto - Super Bowl Weekend’s [Biggest Loser Is Allegiant]( Stadium — Adam Minter [Feedback Jam](: Most annoying athlete-celebrity couple ever? (For me it’s a [no-brainer](.) Let me know at tharshaw@bloomberg.net. [What’s the World Got in Store](? - Feb. 13: US CPI - Dow 5,000 [Rang in]( ’90s Boom. What About S&P 5,000? — Jonathan Levin - Feb. 14: Indonesia election - A Dead Dictator’s [Unwelcome Comeback]( in Indonesia — Karishma Vaswani - Feb. 15: US retail sales - With Zac Posen, Gap Needs to [Avoid Repeating]( a Big Mistake — Leticia Miranda - Feb. 16: US consumer sentiment - Doom Spending [Is Not Self-Care]( — Sarah Green Carmichael [30 Seconds Over Tokyo]( T-Swift isn’t the only megastar on an Asia tour, although it briefly looked like Lionel Messi would be headed back the US under an assumed name if not house arrest. Shuli Ren [says]( Inter Miami’s golden boot was a notorious [no-show]( for the much-hyped friendly in Hong Kong this week, incensing local fans (bad) and Chinese officials (good). But Gearoid Reidy [points out]( that the real story might have been across the East China Sea on Wednesday, where Taylor played to a packed house at the Tokyo Dome while Messi actually ran around like he cared at nearby Japan National Stadium. “The two global superstars appearing at the same time is a coincidence, but nonetheless symbolic of a shift in power in the region — one that has seen Tokyo go from overlooked outlier to arguably Asia’s most attractive destination,” Gearoid writes. “In the battle of financial hubs, heads are turning anew to a city that is enjoying a rare moment. All kinds of indicators are aligned in positivity, with the stock market on Thursday closing at yet another 34-year high and nearly two jobs for every person seeking employment. In contrast to other cities post-Covid, offices are thriving. Investors and influencers alike express surprise at the state of the city, which stands in contrast to decades of doom-laden headlines at the moribund state of Japan’s economy.” Is the era of “Japan passing” at an end? Gearoid thinks you can bet the house on it — just not at BetOnline.ag. Notes: Please send a Clydesdale and feedback to Tobin Harshaw at tharshaw@bloomberg.net. [1] As John Torinus [explains](, Green Bay Packers "stock is valueless in monetary terms because it pays no dividends, and, in the remote chance that the board and shareholders would vote to sell or dissolve at some distant date, no cash would go to shareholders. All the capital gains would go to the Packers charitable foundation." Follow Us Like getting this newsletter? [Subscribe to Bloomberg.com]( for unlimited access to trusted, data-driven journalism and subscriber-only insights. 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