The 'metaverse' bet: Crypto-rich investors snap up virtual real estate
By Elizabeth Howcroft
LONDON (Reuters) - What do you do with a $69 million artwork that
doesn't physically exist?
That's the question faced by the Singapore-based investor calling
himself Metakovan, who made headlines last month when he bought the digital
artwork "Everydays: The First 5000 Days" by the American artist
Beeple at Christie's.
The work is a non-fungible token (NFT) - a new type of virtual
asset that has its ownership status and authenticity verified by blockchain. NFTs have
exploded in popularity in 2021, with prices skyrocketing.
Metakovan, real name Vignesh Sundaresan, plans to put the artwork
on display in four virtual world environments. He is working with architects to
design gallery complexes that the public can enter via web browsers or virtual
reality technology.
But art is just one part of a new economy of blockchain-based
virtual worlds where land, buildings, avatars and even names can be bought and
sold as NFTs, often fetching hundreds of thousands of dollars. In these
environments, referred to as the metaverse, people can wander around with
friends, visit virtual buildings and attend virtual events.
Metakovan's plans are an ambitious undertaking, but he says he is
the world's biggest NFT investor. His collection of NFTs and other crypto
assets, the Metapurse fund, is valued at $189 million, according to
NonFungible.com, a site that aggregates sales history data from NFT
marketplaces.
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