More than a third of AMC online payments are crypto or digital: CEO

May 10, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Adam Aron

“Taken together, these various new payment options, impressively, recently represented about 35% of our total online payments,” said AMC Theatres CEO Adam Aron.

AMC Theatres CEO Adam Aron stated that crypto along with several other digital payment methods recently accounted for 35% of its online payments.

The popular cinema chain has gradually been working on various crypto adoption plays after first rolling out online payment support for Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), and Litecoin (LTC) in November.

Last month it also added support for Dogecoin (DOGE) and Shiba Inu (SHIB) payments via the AMC Theatres mobile app.

Speaking as part of the firm’s 2022 Q1 earnings call on May 9, Aron emphasized that the firm’s plunge into crypto has not only been met with much “fanfare” but also opened up several payment rails that it had previously explored:

“The same IT programming that was required for us to accept cryptocurrency also enabled us to accept other payment types including Apple Pay, Google Pay, Paypal, Bitpay, and Venmo among others. Taken together, these various new payment options, impressively, recently represented about 35% of our total online payments.”

Speaking on AMC’s NFT initiatives, Aron also stated that the company has eight different programs that have either been launched or are in the works this year, and noted that the tech has already helped AMC “stimulate the sale of movie tickets.”

One such NFT promotion was tied to the opening day release of Sony Pictures’ Spider-Man: No Way Home in November, which included roughly 86,000 Spider-Man NFTs for members of its “AMC Stubs Premiere & A-List” and “AMC Investor Connect” subscriptions.

With the impact of the global pandemic starting to wane in 2022, and lockdowns out of sight, AMC posted a strong year-over-year improvement in its Q1 report, with total revenue growing 429.8% to $785.7 million compared to the $148.3 million of Q1 2021.

Net loss also decreased roughly 40% compared to Q1 2021, dropping from $567.2 million to $337.4 million in Q1 2022.

AMC announced 1st quarter 2022 earnings today. Revenues up 5-fold vs. Q1 of 2021. EBITDA loss reduced by 80%. Revenues per patron up 34% over 2019 pre-pandemic. Dr Strange opening was the biggest of 2022, and the 2nd biggest in the last two years! Go see it! Congrats @Disney.
— Adam Aron (@CEOAdam) May 10, 2022

Movie Theater Giant AMC Now Accepts Dog-Themed Meme Coins Shiba Inu (SHIB) and Dogecoin (DOGE), According to CEO

March 11, 2022 The Daily Hodl

AMC Theatres to Accept Dogecoin and Shiba Inu Payments in Coming Weeks, CEO Says

March 1, 2022 Bitcoin.com

AMC Theatres on Track to Accept Dogecoin and Shiba Inu Payments in Q1, CEO Confirms

January 6, 2022 Bitcoin.com

Ripple CEO says the SEC helped Ethereum to overtake XRP as No.2 crypto

October 22, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Adam Aron

The Ripple boss claims his company was unfairly treated which has given Ethereum the edge.

Ripple chief executive Brad Garlinghouse has been airing his thoughts over the state of the crypto market and regulations, and a grudge over the financial regulator’s approach to Ethereum appears to have surfaced.

Speaking at the DC Fintech Week virtual conference on Oct. 21, the Ripple boss declared that Ethereum had been granted a regulatory green light that enabled it to surpass his company’s XRP token.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has been pursuing Ripple over claims that XRP is an unregistered security. In January, Ripple filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the SEC demanding to know why it didn’t consider ETH a security. Six months later in July, a district judge allowed the company to depose a former SEC official who declared in 2018 that ETH was not a security.

Garlinghouse clearly feels that his firm has been hard done by and Ethereum’s subsequent success is at least in part down to more favorable treatment by the SEC. He stated that it is affecting the market, adding:

“Within the last few years, XRP was the second most valuable digital asset. As it became clear the SEC had given a hall pass to ETH, ETH obviously has kind of exploded and that clarity has helped.”

XRP was the second largest crypto asset by market capitalization in late December, 2017. It has currently slipped to seventh place while Ethereum has held the second spot ever since.

Garlinghouse also stated that the SEC has been taking an aggressive posture against crypto with recent actions against his own company and Coinbase. Commenting on Ripple’s battle with the financial regulator, he said that the SEC claims to be protecting consumers but:

“You have nearly 50,000 U.S. people who hold XRP who are trying to sue the SEC for ‘protecting them’.”

Earlier this month a U.S. district judge ruled that individuals holding the company’s XRP token could not participate as defendants in the lawsuit.

The SEC’s request to extend the deadline to complete discovery in its ongoing lawsuit with Ripple Labs and its executives has been granted and pushed to Jan. 14, 2022.

Ripple claims that any further delay in resolving this case will “cause serious harm to the interests of the defendants and XRP holders.”

The court acknowledged this but stated that the “additional time sought by the SEC will not affect the schedule to resolve the case.”

AMC gets ‘hyperactive’ about crypto, CEO says it may issue its own coin

October 21, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Adam Aron

The AMC boss said that there are many reasons why the company could issue its own cryptocurrency.

American multinational entertainment giant AMC is getting very excited about blockchain and the company’s chief executive is publicly mulling the issuance of its own cryptocurrency.

During an interview with CNBC on Oct. 20, AMC chief executive Adam Aron discussed the firm’s crypto ambitions. There were no solid details but the company boss did make some revealing comments.

“We’ve made a lot of noise in the last few months about getting hyperactive in cryptocurrency.”

He then canvassed the possibility of AMC issuing its own coin, stating: “There are a lot of reasons why AMC could be a successful issuer of cryptocurrency as well as a redeemer of cryptocurrency.” He added that this was just one of half a dozen ideas the company is working on at the moment.

AMC is very forward-looking with regards to digital assets. In August, the firm stated that it intended to have the infrastructure in place to accept Bitcoin payments for movie tickets by the end of this year.

The following month, the theater giant expanded on those crypto payment options by including Ethereum, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash. At the time, Aron commented that moviegoers were keen to use crypto as a payment method for their tickets and concessions at AMC theatres.

In early October, AMC added Dogecoin to the list of crypto payment options following a Twitter poll that Aron created that resulted in 68% voting for DOGE from more than 140,000 participants.

I sincerely want to hear your opinion, via this Twitter Poll. By year-end 2021, AMC will take Bitcoin, Etherum, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash for online payments. I hear from many on my Twitter feed we should accept Dogecoin too. Do you think AMC should explore accepting Dogecoin?
— Adam Aron (@CEOAdam) September 21, 2021

On Oct. 6, the company announced digital gift cards that can be purchased with crypto and redeemed for tickets and AMC e-card purchases.

Token issuance for listed companies in the U.S. may be no easy task with ever-increasing regulatory hurdles to overcome. Social media giant Facebook is finding this out the hard way as the scrutiny directed towards its cryptocurrency issuance plans continues to mount.

AMC shot to fame among momentum investors earlier this year when share prices surged after becoming a meme stock favored by retail traders on Reddit’s infamous WallStreetBets forum. At the time of writing AMC shares were trading at $40.86, down marginally on the week, but up 6.2% since the beginning of October.

AMC Theaters’ acceptance of Dogecoin follows viral community appeal

October 6, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Adam Aron

Over the past week, social memecoin DOGE has risen 25% above the previous psychological price threshold of $0.25.

Following an overwhelming positive response to a Twitter poll on Sept. 21, CEO of AMC Theater, Adam Aron announced Wednesday that the chain would officially accept Dogecoin payments for digital gift cards via BitPay Wallet.

The Dogecoin community — notoriously passionate for adoption initiatives — tweeted in droves to advocate for the asset's integration within the theater's payment options. Following the successful endeavor, users can now purchase up to $200 worth of digital gift cards per day. These cards can then be redeemed by theater goers in cinemas across the United States.

Aron was pleasantly surprised by the mass attention, reporting over 6 million views and 140,000 votes on his post, including distinguished Doge fanatics Elon Musk and Mark Cuban. He also claimed that the viral tweet was his “most retweeted, most replied, most liked tweet ever.”

I sincerely want to hear your opinion, via this Twitter Poll. By year-end 2021, AMC will take Bitcoin, Etherum, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash for online payments. I hear from many on my Twitter feed we should accept Dogecoin too. Do you think AMC should explore accepting Dogecoin?
— Adam Aron (@CEOAdam) September 21, 2021

AMC Entertainment have already expressed intent to accept four other cryptocurrency assets: Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), Litecoin (LTC) and Bitcoin Cash (BCH) by the end of 2021. According to the latest data from October 2020, the institution has 620 theaters across the United States, and a further 358 theatres across Europe.

As cryptocurrencies emerge into the mainstream consciousness, positioned to consumers as liberating alternatives to traditional fiat currencies, a new wave of public venues are transitioning their technological infrastructure to accomodate this demand.

Cointelegraph reported in March 2021 that Thailand's largest movie theater operator Major Cineplex Group were piloting a nation-first inaugurate crypto project. This will enable movie-goers to purchase tickets and passes with established digital assets such as Bitcoin.