Minutes after Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos bested the Carolina Panthers to win Super Bowl 50 on Sunday, Venmo, the hugely popular mobile payment app, suddenly went down—or at least got very slow—for many users. The site acknowledged the glitches on Twitter, and appeared to be back up and running as usual about two hours later.
Our payments are experiencing some slowness but we're working hard on a fix. Hang tight! #sb50
— Venmo (@Venmo) February 8, 2016
Back up to speed! Thanks for hanging in there. If you experience any more slowness, reach out to @venmosupport
— Venmo (@Venmo) February 8, 2016
Several Twitter users, however, have a theory for why the outage may not have been a mere coincidence.
LOL Venmo is down right now because everyone is paying up their bets
— Danny (@thelifeofdannyy) February 8, 2016
https://twitter.com/hamilt0n/status/696536696998006784
I think @venmo might be down from all the Super Bowl pool payouts happening right now.
— Michael Gluckstadt (@gluckstadt) February 8, 2016
Venmo is down. HM WONDER WHY.
— Brian Ries (@moneyries) February 8, 2016
There isn’t any proof that the Broncos’ ups and Venmo’s downs were connected, but if the Twitterfolk are right then hundreds of Panthers supporters may have lost more than just a football game.
