After Metaverse, Social Media Giant Meta Plans to Explore the NFT space

After dropping the bomb on the Metaverse space post the highly talked about Meta rebrand of the social media giant Facebook, the firm is headed to explore the NFT space.

According to a recent report by The Financial Times, the social media conglomerate is ‘exploring plans’ to let users create, showcase, and sell NFTs on Facebook and Instagram. 

On the back of Facebook’s Meta rebrand, Metaverse tokens like Decentraland (MANA), The Sandbox (SAND), and others noted major upticks in price, and after the company’s recent revelation of exploring NFTs the same is expected to give a massive boost to the growing sector. 

Meta Mania Meets NFT Craze 

The media giant is working on plans to allow consumers to create and sell NFTs as teams at Facebook and Instagram are in process of preparing a feature that will allow users to display their NFTs on their social media profiles. The move is also expected to push the launch of an NFT marketplace that caters to crypto and NFT enthusiasts. 

For now, the procedure is underway and nothing can be said for sure about the launch date or time. Nonetheless, the media giant’s pivoting interest in the space has yet again pushed a positive narrative for cryptocurrencies and NFTs. 

The discussions around an NFT marketplace had been in the air since last year when media tycoon and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that NFTs could one day be wielded to support a market for digital goods in its planned metaverse.

The company has allocated a mammoth investment of $10 billion annually in building the Metaverse over the coming decade. 

Previously, Instagram head Adam Mosseri in December said that Instagram was ‘actively exploring NFTs’, without sharing specific details. However, as per new reports, Instagram is internally testing its NFT showcasing feature and could come up with something on similar lines in the near future. 

The NFT Boom 

When it comes to Metaverse, blockchain technology and Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) play a crucial role in developing the same. The social media giant has been looking forward to bringing together blockchain tech with virtual reality technology for quite some time.

One reason behind the change in sentiment of bigger market players regarding the Metaverse and NFTs space is the huge popularity the two sectors saw over the last year.

Even though the NFT market is still in its nascent stages it generated over $23 billion in trading volume in 2021, presenting massive expansion according to data from DappRadar. 

In fact, just yesterday, OpenSea recorded a high daily volume of $218 million which is much higher than its average trading volume of $169 million seen last month. That said, recently OpenSea surpassed $3.5 billion in monthly Ether trading volume setting new ATH further highlighting the massive growth the sector saw. 

Additionally, with Meta rivals like Twitter testing NFT showcasing capabilities, and Reddit launching its own collection of NFT avatars it only makes sense for the media giant to jump in on the bandwagon. The effect this shall have on the larger space would most likely be positive but the same remains to be seen.