Visa Partners with Anchorage for CryptoPunk NFT Purchase

Visa has announced that it has successfully added a CryptoPunk NFT (non-fungible token) to its collection of historic artifacts. The firm says it sees a future where NFTs will play an important role in commerce, reports The Block on August 23, 2021.

Visa Buys First NFT

Digital collectibles, also known as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are arguably the hottest properties in the world of crypto at the moment and experts have predicted that the industry would see further growth from its current nearly $3 billion valuation.

Now, global payments giant Visa has taken a major step into the world of NFTs, as the firm has joined forces with Anchorage Digital, a San Francisco-based crypto custodian, to purchase its first NFT.

Per sources close to the matter, Visa purchased the CryptoPunk 7610 NFT from Larva Labs for $150,000. Created during the crypto markets boom of 2017, CrypoPunks is a collection of 10,000 pixels digital artworks depicting misfits and eccentrics, with every one of them having unique features.

An Intersection of Culture and Commerce

Commenting on the firm’s newfound love for NFTS. Cuy Sheffield, Visa’s head of Crypto made it clear that since CryptoPunks is one of the earliest digital collectibles in the blockchain ecosystem, Visa sees the addition of the NFT to its rich collection of artifacts, as a way of celebrating the past, present, and future of commerce.

Interestingly, Visa has hinted that it owns numerous vintage artifacts related to commerce in its art collection, including early paper credit cards. 

Sheffield says NFTs are just like the early days of electronic commerce, when small businesses easily achieved global reach via the internet.

“NFTs enable small businesses to take advantage of blockchain technology to create digital goods that can be delivered almost instantly to a crypto wallet anywhere in the world. We can envision a future where a crypto wallet address becomes as important as your mailing address,” he added.

What’s more, Visa says it’s seeing significant interest in NFTs from merchants, brands, and content creators and it’s now looking to start onboarding these entities into the world of NFTs. It has also published a whitepaper aimed at guiding businesses on how to integrate NFTs into their operations.

In related news, BTCManager informed earlier in July 2021, that Coca Cola partnered with OpenSsa and Decentraland to roll out its NFT collections.