Get Closer To Polygon & NFTs

Polygon Matic was still called Matic Network back then. Given that the project was founded by 4 Indians, I had a naive investment thesis that if India eventually changed its attitude towards crypto, then considering the country's population, the project would experience tremendous growth.

By offering all scalable technologies and utilities, Polygon Matic provides value to their ecosystem. This value is represented by the price appreciation of the MATIC token, which is used as a gas token to transact within the ecosystem. This token does not seek to be the next reserve currency or store of value. The success of the token depends not only on ecosystem adoption but also on various other elements, such as: 

• Investor issuance and lock-up

MATIC has a limited supply of 10 billion tokens. Currently the supply is around 8 billion, which means 20% of the max supply has not been released on the market. 19% of the total supply was sold to the public in April 2019 at $0.0026 per token.

• Token Burn

Whatever your concerns (or lack thereof) about token distribution, it is interesting to note that Polygon implemented their own version of Ethereum's EIP-1559 proposal. This is a token burning mechanism that many consider a success. In short, the more the network grows, the more tokens are burned. If burns exceed issuance, the currency will deflate.

• Regulation background

One thing we all need to consider is that large-scale regulation looms over the crypto space like a dark cloud. Today's wonder kids could very well be tomorrow's whipping boys. A regulatory overhaul could ultimately cause some disasters to occur, but until we get clarity, it's hard to predict who will be the scapegoat. Please note that this warning is not aimed directly at Polygon or its founders. It is simply my personal opinion that one should tread carefully and factor in appropriate risks when participating in unregulated territory.

Polygon NFT’s

NFT's are also growing in popularity at Polygon. The bear market with a low gas fee environment has been the perfect time to migrate NFT projects off the Ethereum main layer.

Polygon as an NFT ecosystem is also getting a lot of interest from Solana-based projects after Solana collapsed due to the FTX collapse. Looking at the strength of their business development, I don't see this slowing down anytime soon.

Speaking of business development. They won't stop, right? All these brands have something cooking at Polygon:

✅ Disney

✅ Starbucks

✅ Instagram

✅ Nike

✅ Prada

✅ Adidas

And there are many more to come that I imagine.

What's new in 2023?

Recently Italian luxury fashion brand Prada and sportswear giant Adidas have joined forces to launch an NFT project built on the Polygon network.

The project will allow fans or customers to contribute their own designs.

Prada and Adidas Originals said they will auction the NFT collection designed by digital artist Zach Lieberman on SuperRare on 28-31 January. Proceeds from the sale of the NFTs will be donated to charities that support artists and creators.

Prada and Adidas tie-up is another sign of apparel brands aggressively entering the digital space in a bid to deliver more digital experiences to customers.

Reporting from Coindesk, Saturday (22/1/2022), investment bank company Morgan Stanley estimates that the total NFT market will grow to $300 billion or around Rp4,297 trillion (assuming an exchange rate of Rp14,323 per US dollar) by 2030.

The report identifies luxury brands such as Gucci, Balenciaga as best positioned to benefit from digital collaboration in the metaverse.

Prada and Adidas said they will also launch their third collaboration, dubbed "Adidas for Prada Re-Nylon Collection," in the metaverse. In the press release the companies did not specify which metaverse will be used, but Adidas has worked with The Sandbox before.

"Prada sees the emerging metaverse as a new space for brands to redefine luxury for the next generation and foster shared experiences that honour the brand's spirit of experimentation and creativity," said Prada's marketing director and head of corporate social responsibility, Lorenzo Bertelli, as quoted by Coindesk, Friday, 21 January 2022.

Luxury fashion brands have made millions of dollars from NFT auctions. Last September, Italian haute couture label Dolce & Gabbana launched its NFT collection, Collezione Genesi, which sold for around USD 5.65 million.

Also, recently, footwear company Crocs filed a trademark application on 11 January that would extend its brand into the realm of NFTs.