HK football team launches NFTs; Food concept offers crypto mooncakes

Transcript

Welcome to The Daily Forkast, August 25th,2021. I’m Angie Lau, Editor-in-Chief of Forkast.News.

Coming up, Asia’s first football NFTs are coming to Hong Kong, that’s soccer for you Americans. Mooncakes for the Mid Autumn Festival a sign of crypto adoption in Asia, a field report from Hong Kong. And the September issue is one of the most revered issues in fashion, Vogue Singapore is launching an NFT cover.

Let’s get you up to speed from Asia to the world.

Hong Kong’s Resources Capital Football Club is bringing NFT collectibles to its fans, a first for an Asian football team.

RCFC joins the growing list of clubs like Manchester City, Liverpool and Bayern Munich that have also released NFT collections.

Resources Capital Football Club is partnering up with OliveX. This is a digital health and fitness company, whose founding shareholder is Hong Kong based Blockchain Gaming Unicorn and Animoca Brands, to launch the NFTs.

Forkast.News Michelle Lim has more from Hong Kong.

Resources Capital Football Club, a local team playing in the Hong Kong Premier League, Wednesday officially launched its NFT deal, which will see an exclusive NFT collectible card of the team’s goalkeeper Lam Chun Kit, one of Hong Kong’s top players, go up for auction.

The winning bidder will also get special access to all of the team’s matches for the rest of the season. 

Apart from the auction of Lam’s NFT, other NFTs being launched include 50 packs featuring collectible cards of the other players on the team.

The club says it wants to enter this new booming space as early as it can and hopes more people, especially the younger generation, will learn about sports through NFTs.

“We hope this will enable more interaction with the fans, and it’s not just about the development of NFT or boost the popularity of the football society, but hope they can get more out of this.”

It’s still early days, but for the players, they hope that it will build their brand and take them to the next level.

How do you expect your cards to do?

“I think everyone wants my card. Why wouldn’t you? The acceleration, the pace of the shooting. Why not have this? I’d say I don’t want to sound too big headed, but probably one of the best cards in that, so…”

“I think for that for our club it’s a very good thing, for our fans it’s a very good thing, and also for our for our players.”

OliveX, the company that is developing the NFTs for RCFC, says these digital assets will help build excitement around the team and generate additional revenues.

“Football clubs are always looking for more ways to monetize other than just ticket sales, right? Especially in the new covid world, so they’re thinking of new ways to expand. Obviously, they’ll need sponsors, but NFT, I definitely think is a way in, especially in Asia, for them to support their clubs. So we definitely see a trend in there.”

A trend the team and the developer hope will score points with the fans.

For Forkast.News I’m Michelle Lim in Hong Kong.

Staying in Hong Kong, where the love of crypto is working its way into all aspects of life.

One vegetarian food concept company has jumped on a new way to mark the mid autumn festival – crypto moon cakes.

The holiday is on September 21st this year with people celebrating by gazing at the full moon and hoping for a bountiful harvest while, of course, eating the baked delicacies.

But what is this saying about the speed of crypto acceptance in Asia? A lot.

Forkast.News Carolyn Wright has more from Hong Kong.

Hong Kong based vegetarian food concept Esca is offering a box of four assorted Crypto mooncakes for HKD$350, or around US$45.

The moon cakes feature various cryptocurrency logos stamped on top, with Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana and even Dogecoin represented.

“I’m obviously very much into crypto, and I think this space is amazing and growing fast. So I thought that, you know, I also love mooncake, so these two put together, I think it’d be quite neat and that would be a quite a niche market.”

Wan also says that he’s all for accepting crypto currencies as payments for the mooncakes and that his plan is to start accepting Bitcoin, Ether and Solana.

But you’ll have to get your skates on if you want to try them. The tasty treats are only available until September 21st.

Despite concerns over tightening regulations, they’re just one example of how enthusiasm for the crypto industry in Hong Kong continues to grow at a pace.

For Forkast.News, I’m Carolyn Wright in Hong Kong.

Get ready to strike a pose.

Vogue Singapore is launching an NFT cover for the all important September issue.

The winning bidder of this digital only dress by French fashion house Balmain, which literally is set afire digitally at least, will receive a digital certificate of authenticity and get to wear it in the fashion gaming app, Altava.

Vogue Singapore, winning over Conde Nast and eventually the most powerful woman in fashion, Anna Wintour, one NFT at a time.

And finally today, I’m excited to share a little news from us at Forkast.News.

We’re launching an exclusive new podcast, a special series called The Future Rules, powered by the Filecoin Foundation.

I’ll be hosting alongside top legal mind and Filecoin Foundation board chair Marta Belcher.

We’re going to be joined by some of the most renowned names in the industry to dive into the ethical and legal issues that future technology will raise.

First episode, Sheila Warren, head of Blockchain Digital Assets and Data Policy at the World Economic Forum as we jump in to DeFi.

I’m super excited about it, and I hope you’ll join us.

You can listen and subscribe to The Future Rules wherever you get your podcast fix. And of course, right here on Forkast.News.

And that’s the daily Forkast from our vantage point right here in Asia.
For more, visit Forkast.News. I’m Editor-in-Chief, Angie Lau. Until the next time.