While national soccer teams compete on the field for the ultimate prize – the World Cup — Adidas and Nike are doing battle in retail stores with tournament merchandise. The Adidas logo appears on the game balls and much of the equipment used in the competition. Such global exposure looks like it is benefiting Adidas, since earnings are expected to see a 61.4% jump this quarter. Adidas is the main sponsor of the championship, but Nike is also dominating the soccer play field … so who will have the highest score? Who dominates in the U.S.? Although this is a

World Cup sponsors Adidas and Nike are competing for retail gold.

The World Cup kicks off this week, with Russia hosting FIFA’s quadrennial footballing spectacle. An estimated 3.4 billion viewers are set to tune in to watch some of sport’s biggest stars vie for international glory. On the surface, that type of exposure would appear to be invaluable to the host nation. However, most studies do not find any material economic benefit to hosts of large international events such as the World Cup. Asset prices are a slightly different story. Hosts’ equity markets tend to rally ahead of the event. Of the five previous hosts, only one, Brazil, did not experience