As the popularity of non-fungible tokens (NFTs), blockchain-based digital assets soar, there seems to be a rise in personalised NFTs in India. Case in point, BeyondLife is the NFT platform for actor Amitabh Bachchan and is one of the first clubs to provide NFTs in fiat currency. In 2021, Amitabh Bachchan NFT was sold for $1 million. “The NFT studios and launchpads create greenfield concept for a particular brand or artist to be dropped to their fanbase. Personalised NFTs will give rise to a new generation of data brokers, with unique and equitable reward mechanisms,” Saurav Raaj, founder and director at Wize, an NFT infrastructure for businesses company, told FE Digital Currency.
Popular NFTs of celebrities such as Amitabh Bachchan, Manish Malhotra, Kamal Hassan, and Dinesh Karthik, among others are currently sold across several cryptocurrency exchanges.
However, NFT companies have posted a decline in transaction since last year. NFT transactions have dropped by 75% in this March to less than $1 billion from $3.9 billion in February this year. “The novelty of NFTs wore off by Q4,CY2021 (November 1, 2021 to December 31, 2021). NFTs have better utilisation capabilities than just coins. So, NFTs have evolved past speculation and gone on to tangible utility territory. Thus, NFT can outlast any winter,” Arjun Reddy, chief technology officer at Guardian Link, said.
As per industry observers, the other issue of art being into NFT without the knowledge of the creator. What this does is, the creator is deprived of the credit often. “It’s not automatically assumed that the original artist will own the rights to NFTs. It becomes a case of proving ownership to the underlying asset. Once the artist is able to establish the legal links between NFT and the original asset, she will get the credit,” Aniket Jindal, co-founder, chief operating officer, (COO), Biconomy, said. Meanwhile, duplication, counterfeiting, and fraudulent versions of the original work leads to loss of intellectual property (IP), lost profits, and possible legal action. “By cross-referencing artwork, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning systems can assist in overcoming this difficulty,” Raaj stated.
As the NFT market continues to grow, industry experts opined that so has the crime. According to Mahip Singh Sikarwar, an advocate, apart from money-laundering, NFTs are used for wash-trading, wherein both buyer and seller orchestrate records of sales to provide an impression that an NFT is highly sought after, only to artificially inflate its price, and then later sell it to individuals at a high price.
Also Read: India’s cryptocurrency yield account 24Carret earns up to 17% APY on cryptocurrency holdings