Tech giants vow to resist NFT hype; Squid token under scrutiny

Transcript

NFTs are dominating the conversation in the newsroom today.

Welcome to The Daily Forkast, November 1st, 2021. I’m Angie Lau, Editor-in-Chief of Forkast.News covering all things blockchain.

Well, ripples from criticism over NFT hype continue to spread in China, with a trio of the biggest tech names in the country joining forces in vowing never to get involved in NFT hype and virtual currencies. We’re going to take a look at that solemn vow and what it involves and a whole lot more coming up.

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

All right, kicking off with some of the top stories out of Asia today. First up, Hong Kong-based venture capital firm CMCC Global aims to gather US$300 million worth of investments in its latest crypto fund, with patronage from Hong Kong billionaire Richard Li and Gemini co-founders the Winklevoss twins, CMCC plans to allot its new fund into DeFi and NFTs.

Meanwhile, over in China, the September 24th ban on crypto mining and trading continues to bite, with another local government cracking down. Ganzhou, a prefecture-level city in the eastern province of Jiangxi, says its economic development zone is working with authorities on carrying out inspections at a local industrial park.

The authorities say warning letters have been issued to companies in the area, with businesses and licenses being inspected.

You can find out more on those stories and a whole lot more on Forkast.News.

All right, staying in China with growing criticism from state media over NFT hype. Three of China’s best known tech giants have jointly issued what they are calling a self-disciplinary industry convention. Ant Group, JD Technology and Tencent Cloud all have pledged to resist the hype and are rebranding NFT projects as digital collectibles. Forkast.News Timmy Shen has all the details.

According to a statement released by Ant Group’s blockchain arm AntChain, the trio issued a convention relating to what they call digital, cultural and creative works, pledging not to get involved in cryptocurrency and saying they will work to prevent speculation and risks of money laundering. And Guofei Jiang, vice president of Ant Group, said in a statement that digital collectibles on AntChain are packed with the real value of quality, cultural, intellectual property and artworks, and that a company resists any form of malicious hype.

AntChain confirmed the rebranding of NFTs as digital collectibles in a tweet last week, and Huanhe, an NFT app that Tencent, launched in August, has also removed references to NFTs from the app.

While NFTs were not included in China’s recent stepped-up ban on crypto-related activities, both the Securities Times, which is sister paper of the People’s Daily and the Chinese government aligned Guangming Daily, have recently published opinion pieces criticizing hype over NFTs.

For Forkast.News, I’m Timmy Shen. Taipei, Taiwan.

Meanwhile, last week we brought you the news of Squid Game cryptocurrency, a parody token based on the hit Netflix series from South Korea.

Well, its price has continued to skyrocket, according to CoinMarketCap. It’s soared more than 50,000% in just four days. Be that as it may, the token remains under scrutiny as users claim they cannot sell it, and there are a lot more questions over infringement of Netflix’s intellectual property. Forkast.News Danny Park has more.

It was trading at US$7 on Friday — now, it’s at US$38. The power meme coin that sprung out of Netflix Squid Game is the talk of the global crypto space, but with growing suspicion.

PancakeSwap, the tokens only market, has warned investors of multiple reports of users being unable to sell the Squid Coin. And one Twitter user called the project “100% rugpull”, a term where the owner of a crypto project gathers investments, then abandons the project.

Others take issue with the possible infringement of Netflix intellectual property, with no official license from Netflix to be found, nor can any affiliation with the drama’s makers be identified.

Meanwhile, FWENCLUB, a platform for collectibles under Hong Kong-based creative studio AllRightsReserved, recently released a line of Squid Game toys, which are officially licensed from Netflix.

Its creators acknowledge that the hit TV series resulted in many fake products both in and out of the crypto space. However, they have a plan to combat fakes using blockchain technology

“The kind of unauthorized project won’t actually last long. Because it’s something that people don’t think that’s with credibility. So what we’re doing right now, is to develop a platform with high security, and credibility. Creators are able to acquire royalties through blockchain, through NFTs, and also, people can identify fake products.”

FWENCLUB will soon launch an app where buyers can scan a physical NFT tag to verify authenticity of their purchases. Securing creative rights may be harder in this nascent world of crypto and NFTs. However, the key to ensuring authenticity may lie in that self same Blockchain technology.

For Forkast.News, I’m Danny Park.

And that’s The Daily Forkast from our vantage point right here in Asia, and we truly hope that we are hitting the right spot. So why don’t you hit us back? Hit like, hit subscribe. We appreciate it always. It helps us reach our goal to reach more of you.

Visit Forkast.News, for a whole lot more. I’m Editor-in-Chief Angie Lau. Until the next time.