Visa has announced the purchase of a CryptoPunk NFT, furthering its commitment to understanding cryptocurrency services with the goal of offering them to its clients and customers.
Visa Buys a CryptoPunk
Visa has become the unlikely owner of a CryptoPunk.
The financial services giant has revealed itself as the buyer of Punk #7610 in a blog post published Monday. The company bought the Punk for 49.5 ETH or around $149,939 at the time of purchase on Aug. 18.
Over the last 60 years, Visa has built a collection of historic commerce artifacts – from early paper credit cards to the zip-zap machine. Today, as we enter a new era of NFT-commerce, Visa welcomes CryptoPunk #7610 to our collection. https://t.co/XoPFfwxUiu
— VisaNews (@VisaNews) August 23, 2021
Along with announcing its CryptoPunk purchase, Visa published an interview with Cuy Sheffield, the company’s Head of Crypto, to help explain the decision. Sheffield stated that Visa bought a CryptoPunk “first and foremost to learn,” going on to explain a more detailed rationale for the purchase. Sheffield said:
“We think NFTs will play an important role in the future of retail, social media, entertainment, and commerce. To help our clients and partners participate, we need a firsthand understanding of the infrastructure requirements for a global brand to purchase, store, and leverage an NFT.”
Sheffield went on to list several use cases for NFTs, including sports memorabilia applications like NBA Top Shot and possible integration of NFTs into the music industry, asserting that Visa expects “a huge range of new cases in the years ahead.”
Since Visa announced the news of its Punk purchase, the market for CryptoPunks has entered a frenzy. The lowest-priced Punks have quickly been bought up, raising the floor price to around 63 ETH, worth $211,000 at today’s prices. Just three weeks ago, the price for the cheapest CryptoPunk shot up to 34 ETH when an unknown buyer swept the floor, purchasing a total of 88 Punks in one transaction. By factoring in today’s Punk price movement and the appreciation of Ethereum, CryptoPunks are up over 100% this month.
Disclaimer: At the time of writing this feature, the author owned BTC and ETH.
