The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), one of the world‘s largest exchanges by daily trading volume, today said it would issue non-fungible tokens (NFTs) for stocks listed on its platform. Six NYSE listings would be minted as the ’First Trade NFTs on the blockchain.
The move is the first-of-its-kind and a landmark for the NFT market, which was valued under $200 million in 2019 but has since surged to a $25 billion behemoth.
NFTs are blockchain-based representations of tangible or non-tangible assets that prove the true ownership of the underlying asset with whoever holds those NFTs. These can range from the quirky to the serious, and from digital pizzas to CryptoPunks to real-estate.
NFTs before Bitcoin on the NYSE
The six publicly listed firms to be offered as NFTs would be music-streaming service Spotify, cloud-computing player Snowflake, video game development firm Unity, delivery giant DoorDash, online gaming platform Roblox and end-to-end e-commerce and logistics network Coupang.
“These non-fungible tokens memorialize a company‘s First Trade using the blockchain’s digital ledger and provide irrefutable proof of authenticity and ownership,” the firm explained, adding that the First Trade is the exact moment a company became public, creating a rare, one-of-its-kind digital collectible for retail investors.
The NFTs are available on crypto firm Crypto.coms NFT page, with just one edition of each available for sale. They contain the exact time, date, price, and other relevant trading information for each of the 6 stocks.
“Innovation is what we do at the NYSE. We were the first with Direct Listings and at the forefront of the emergence of SPACs,” said the NYSE in a tweet. “Now we want to help drive this new wave of NFT innovation,” it ended.