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Carolina Panthers star Russel Okung receives half of his $13 million salary in Bitcoin.

Carolina Panthers offensive lineman Russell Okung said he was paid in bitcoin after asking to be paid in the cryptocurrency f
Carolina Panthers offensive lineman Russell Okung said he was paid in bitcoin after asking to be paid in the cryptocurrency for almost two years.

Carolina Panthers offensive lineman Russell Okung is now reportedly receiving half of his salary in bitcoin. Pro football player has been a strong bitcoin advocate for years, and he has been asking to be paid in bitcoin since May 2019. Then he tweeted on Tuesday that he was “Paid in bitcoin.” However, Okung is not receiving bitcoin directly from the Carolina Panthers but through a third-party payment service called Strike, an application developed by Zap Solutions Inc., which helps people convert any percentage of their paychecks into bitcoin.

Panthers reportedly will pay part of Okung’s $13 million salary in bitcoin.

Under the current agreement, the Panthers reportedly will pay part of Okung’s $13 million salary to Strike, which will pay Okung in bitcoin. Okung is the Panthers’ highest-paid player for this season. His salary agreement is handled internally by the Panthers, CNBC explained, adding that the National Football League and its players’ union were both unaware of Okung’s agreement until Tuesday’s announcement. However, they did not attempt to void or officially sign off on the agreement. An NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy told the publication: “There wasn’t anything to sign off on. The clubs pay the players in US dollars. What the players or his agents do with the money is up to them.”

The famous football player is all praise for bitcoin.

Okung said in a statement that money is more than currency; it’s power. The way money is handled from creation to dissemination is part of that power. Getting paid in bitcoin is the first step of opting out of the corrupt, manipulated economy we all inhabit, he added. The pro football star frequently tweets about bitcoin. “You can make ‘x’ a year and watch it slowly erode with inflation or you can protect your hard-earned money with bitcoin,” he wrote after announcing that he was paid in the cryptocurrency.

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