Three Years Of Operation, GameStop Finally Raises Hands From NFT Business, Marketplace Will Be Closed Starting February 2024
GameStop, the world's largest video game retailer, announced that it will close its non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace on February 2, 2024. In fact, the NFT marketplace was recently released by GameStop. The reason for this closure is "uncertainty of regulations continuing in the crypto space," as announced through its website.
The NFT GameStop marketplace is a platform that allows gamers, creators, collectors, and other community members to buy, sell and exchange NFTs related to video games. The platform is based on Ethereum Layer 2, a scalability solution that offers transactions faster and cheaper than Ethereum's main network.
GameStop has previously released the NFT marketplace teaser in May 2021, shortly after its stock surged dramatically due to a boost from retail investors on social media. The platform was officially launched in July 2022 and became one of the most popular NFT marketplaces at the time. In the first two months, the platform managed to generate trading volumes of US$6 million (Rp93.75 billion).
However, market interest in NFT Gamestop did not last long. In the past month, the trading volume of this platform has only been around US$40,000 (Rp625 million). In addition, GameStop also removed support for its own NFT wallet in November 2023 for the same reason as its marketplace closure.
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The GameStop decision is in line with the downward trend in enthusiasm for NFT among large companies. Previously, social media platform X also stopped its NFT profile picture feature last week, after receiving criticism from some users.
As part of efforts to enter the NFT market, GameStop also received a grant from Immutable, a layer-2 gaming company, to set up a $ 100 million NFT gaming fund. GameStop then sold most of the tokens obtained from the deal on the secondary market.
In addition, GameStop is also integrated with Loopring, a layer-2 protocol that allows decentralized digital asset exchange. Loopring claims that this integration will improve user experience and reduce Ethereum's gas costs.
Although GameStop has raised its hands about its business in the realm of NFT, the gaming sector is still one of the most promising fields for future development.