Facebook’s Metaverse Will Support NFTs

Facebook said Thursday the company’s metaverse will support non-fungible tokens (NFT) in a possible boost to the Ethereum protocol, where the digital collectibles format has thrived.

“This will make it easier for people to sell Limited Edition digital objects like NFTs, display them in their digital spaces and even resell them to the next person securely,” Facebook Head of Metaverse Products Vishal Shah said.

The news comes as Facebook delves further into the virtual world. The social media behemoth already owns virtual reality headset maker Oculus and recently signaled a major hiring push for its metaverse unit.

“Our goal is to provide a way for as many players as possible to build a business in the metaverse,” Shah said.

The monetization push could dovetail with the company’s Novi crypto wallet, which faced pushback from U.S. lawmakers after a pilot launch earlier this month. Diem, the project’s namesake stablecoin, is not yet involved. On Thursday, David Marcus, Facebook’s head of payments and financial services, tweeted that with the rebrand, the company was consolidating all of its payments and financial services units and products, including Facebook Pay, under the Novi brand.

After teasing its NFT tie-up, Facebook changed its name to Meta, further hinting at the company’s commitment to building out its version of the metaverse.

How it will depart from open metaverses like Decentraland and Cryptovoxels has yet to be determined.

Facebook stock (NASDAQ: FB) is up 3.5% today, most of that coming after the start of the event at 1 p.m. ET.

In another sign of Facebook’s metaverse fascination, the company’s stock will trade under ticker symbol MVRS starting Dec. 1.

UPDATE (Oct. 28, 18:38 UTC): Adds Facebook name change.

UPDATE (Oct. 28, 18:47 UTC): Adds Facebook stock reaction.

UPDATE (Oct. 28, 18:52 UTC): Adds new Facebook stock ticker.

UPDATE (Oct. 28, 19:29 UTC): Adds information about Novi brand consolidation.