Ukraine to issue non-fungible tokens to fund armed forces
theguardian.comUkraine has announced it will issue non-fungible tokens to fund its armed forces, as cryptocurrency becomes an increasingly popular means of giving support to the government in Kyiv.
Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s vice-prime minister, said on Twitter on Thursday that the government would soon issue NFTs to help pay for its military.
NFTs confer ownership of a unique digital item – with pieces of virtual art proving particularly popular – upon their buyer, even if that item can be easily copied. Ownership is recorded on a digital, decentralised ledger known as a blockchain.
Fedorov did not give further details of the NFTs but said the government had cancelled earlier plans to reward cryptocurrency donors with an airdrop, a free digital token typically used by the crypto community to encourage participation in a project.
<p lang=«en» dir=«ltr» xml:lang=«en»>After careful consideration we decided to cancel airdrop. Every day there are more and more people willing to help Ukraine to fight back the agression. Instead, we will announce NFTs to support Ukrainian Armed Forces soon. We DO NOT HAVE any plans to issue any fungible tokensThe move comes as a Ukrainian appeal for cryptocurrency donations passed $50m (£38m), after Fedorov posted a request for donations in bitcoin, ethereum and tether on Twitter last week.
<p lang=«en» dir=«ltr» xml:lang=«en»>Stand with the people of Ukraine Now accepting cryptocurrency donations. Ethereum. Bitcoin and Tether (USDTtrc20) BTC — 357a3So9CbsNfBBgFYACGvxxS6tMaDoa1P ETH — 0x165CD37b4C644C2921454429E7F9358d18A45e14 USDT (trc20) — TEFccmfQ38cZS1DTZVhsxKVDckA8Y6VfCyThe appeal has now raised $54.7m for the Ukrainian government and a Ukrainian NGO, according to Elliptic, a blockchain data and analytics
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