Meta is scrapping its nonfungible token features across its social media platforms, Facebook and Instagram.
Meta’s head of commerce and financial technologies Stephane Kasriel tweeted the news on March 13, saying Meta is winding down its NFT support to focus on other ways to support creators, people, and businesses.”
Kasriel added the firm is still prioritizing ways for users to connect with their fans and monetize and will focus on tools such as building payment rails on its platform and through its messaging apps, along with monetizing Reels, the short-form videos that feature on Facebook and Instagram.
The NFT features expanded again in August as Instagram made NFT tools available to over 100 countries. In November last year, Metlaunched an “end-to-end toolkit” for minting and trading NFTs within Instagram.
The announcement received scathing criticism from the crypto community, with NFT artist Dave Krugman tweeting it was “a short-sighted move” and that Meta quit before it even started.
Meta’s scrapping of its NFT tools aligns with other cost-cutting measures across the company as it directs focus to its expensive metaverse ambitions.
Last year alone, its metaverse-building division Reality Labs recorded its largest-ever yearly losses at $13.7 billion. Meta also undertook in November the first mass layoff in the company’s history, cutting 13% of its workforce, some 11,000 staff.
