eBay Officially Launches NFT Sales on Its Platform
Nicholas Otieno May 12, 2021 04:10
eBay has moved to get a piece of the pie in the NFT market share.
eBay Inc. has announced that it will allow the sales of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) for digital collectibles such as video clips, images, arts, photos, audios, and other types of digital files on its platforms.
The US multinational e-commerce corporation told Reuters that from now going forward, an "NFT inventory will be provided to sellers who meet eBay's standards."
“NFTs have reached a tipping point of credibility, trust and adoption so that mainstream audiences now feel comfortable exchanging new forms of digital collectibles," said Jordan Sweetnam, general manager and senior vice president for eBay’s North America market.
The company has invested heavily in infrastructures for physical collectibles such as trading cards as well as items such as watches and sneakers that help verify for buyers. Customers can bid on NFTs the same way they do for physical collectibles.
Whether customers are looking for a digital representation of Elon Musk holding Doge or a physical Dogecoin replica, eBay is now the marketplace to get these products. Customers will make all payments in US dollars, unlike other major NFT platforms that normally accept Ether payments for NFT.
Several NFTs that are currently available for sales on eBay appear on the WAX blockchain, and sellers stating that buyers need to create a WAX wallet in order to get their NFTs.
Currently eBay wants to ensure that NFTs are listed by trusted sellers and only in certain categories such as art, music, trading cards, and entertainment. The firm said that it plans to expand its tools and policies in future to allow more categories after they collected feedback from the community regarding the current group of NFTs.
NFT Market Rages
The development comes after eBay stated last week that it accepted cryptocurrency as a payment method and was also planning to get NFTs on its platform. The latest embrace by eBay follows billions of dollars in NFT purchases over the previous few months.
The demand for NFTs continues to rise and the NFT market shows no signs of slowing down. Year-to-date, within less than three months, the combined market capitalization of major NFT projects has risen by 1,785%.
NFT sales have skyrocketed alongside the valuation of NFT-related tokens. Major NFT marketplaces such as Opensea and Rarible have witnessed their sales increase by somewhere between 50-fold to 100-fold in the past three months.
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