An anonymous “collector of all things Bleeding Edge and Scarce” known as WhaleShark has announced the launch of a new social currency backed by art and digital land in the form of non fungible tokens (NFTs) stored on the blockchain.
According to the sparse whitepaper, the currency will be known as $Whale and have a maximum supply of 10 million tokens of which 50% will be available to the public. Included within the basket of assets said to be backing the token include NFTs from Gods Unchained, Rare Digital Art, Sandbox, Ethereum Name Services and Crypto Motors.
The impressive list of desirable art, gaming and digital real estate NFTs, which can be seen on WhaleShark’s Opensea account, is said to have cost the company upwards of US$1 million to acquire.
Accelerate or Caution
While some commentators, such as WAX Co-Founder and CEO William Quigley, have cautioned against over-optimism in the NFT space, others like technology journalist Nichanan Kesonpat believe the “…ecosystem has evolved a lot over the past 2 years…and right now now it feels that innovation in the space is accelerating the more developers, artists, and capital pour in.”
WhaleShark asserts that now is the time for a cryptocurrency to be underpinned by NFTs as currency needs to evolve away from what is currently available.
Stating that fiat currency has lost “…the ability to have a provable base of value…” WhaleShark also argues that “While crypto resolved the challenges of scarcity, fluctuations in the prices of crypto have made it unrealistic and unreliable as a medium and method of payment.”
In making an asset backed currency, it is claimed that instead of using a commodity like gold, holding value in digital art and collectibles seeks “…to strike a balance between wealth preservation and speculation through a well balanced “basket” of the rarest NFTs.”
Although the anonymous nature of WhaleShark will undoubtedly make potential investors wary of the new currency, the idea of NFTs being a possible store of value is a concept that is gaining traction elsewhere.
The most recent proof of which is the application of Decentraland to have their native MANA token considered as collateral in Multi-collateral DAI stablecoin.
