Twitch streamer xQc loses £400k in catastrophic World Cup bet

TWITCH streamer Félix ‘xQc’ Lengyel placed a whopping $500k (£400k) bet on the World Cup finals and ended up losing it all.

The Canadian streamer rose to fame by hosting gambling content. This type of streaming has since been banned by Twitch.

However, that doesn’t mean xQc has stopped streaming. As a former professional Overwatch player he is still known for his gaming content.

He is also allowed to gamble in his free time, just not on Twitch, though with the latest results he probably wishes he hadn’t.

The bet was simple. XQc believed that France would take home the World Cup trophy for the second time in a row.

It was not meant to be, however, as not even a hat trick from Kylian Mbappé could save the French squad, who lost 4 – 2 on penalties to Argentina.

Following the result, xQc tweeted a picture of himself with a solemn look.

He wrote: “Good game all round. Fun watch. -$650k I guess…”

While the bet was placed in the US for $500k, in the tweet xQc refers to his home currency Canadian dollars, making the total higher.

Brazil were the favourites to win throughout the competition, until they were knocked out in the quarter-finals by Croatia.

Going into the finals, odds were roughly equal between Argentina and France to take home the crown.

However, one gaming company predicted that Argentina would win before the tournament even began.

By using in-game simulations, based on players’ real-life data, FIFA 23 correctly predicted that Argentina would come out on top.

It also correctly predicted that Lionel Messi would take home the Golden Ball, and Argentina’s goalkeeper Emiliano Martínez would pick up the Golden Glove.

EA Sports, the creators of the FIFA series, has used in-game simulations to predict the winners of the last four World Cups.

Perhaps next time xQc will take a note from FIFA’s book before placing such a large bet.

Written by Georgina Young on behalf of GLHF.