According to recent data, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, might be planning to launch its crypto exchange. The company has filed for eight new trademark applications of the Meta logo covering crypto tokens, blockchain software, virtual currency exchanges, financial and currency trading, and digital, crypto, and virtual currencies.
Trademark lawyer Mike Kondoudis, who specializes in NFT and metaverse trademarks, shared the trademark numbers on Twitter. He also said that“these filings reflect the company’s strategy for moving into the metaverse. Meta clearly has significant plans for the virtual economy that will drive it.”
Meta Platforms has filed 8 trademark applications for its Logo. The applications cover:
Crypto tokens
— Mike Kondoudis (@KondoudisLaw) March 23, 2022
Crypto trading potential – Meta Exchange
The rise in metaverse popularity means that NFT real estate could sell for $1 billion in 2022. Moreso, regulation around digital assets is currently at the forefront of government policy. As assets and land in the metaverse become more commonly tradable across social media, it would be an obvious step for Meta to add NFTs to the Facebook Marketplace. This week’s application would allow them to be so under the Meta brand from a trademark perspective. However, NFTs could be deemed a financial asset and subject to financial trading laws in the U.S. If this were to happen, and Meta wanted to offer NFT trading on its platform, it would need to protect its brand within this category. Mark Zuckerberg recently revealed that NFTs would be coming to Instagram, so, in some ways, this is already in play. However, there are other legal and regulatory minefields to cross other than simply trademarking your brand to be legally allowed to trade financial assets.
While there is no direct news regarding whether the trademark signals a Meta crypto exchange is coming anytime soon, it does seem increasingly possible that it could be in the pipeline. We know that Meta wants to be at the forefront of metaverse technology. It’s literally in their name and mission statement.
The metaverse is the next evolution of social connection. Our company’s vision is to help bring the metaverse to life, so we are changing our name to reflect our commitment to this future.
A metaverse-focused exchange would be a logical step in the road to conquering the metaverse. Meta cannot control every metaverse project without investing hundreds of billions of dollars. The market cap of Sandbox alone is currently $4.2 billion, while the decentralized nature of blockchain means they can’t just buy the competition as they did with Instagram. So, another method would be to become a hub for all metaverse projects—a centralized location for trading metaverse tokens, NFTs, and other digital assets. The Meta exchange would be a portal into the metaverse for all projects. From there, it may also make sense to list popular coins such as Ethereum and Bitcoin as on-ramps to the metaverse for crypto investors. Suddenly, you have Facebook as the centralized heart of the global metaverse. With Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram, they already control a large percentage of daily international attention. Will they be able to capture the metaverse too?
Meta in the metaverse
Meta has also filed for trademarks of new names, Meta Portal and Meta Horizon, to cover VR, AR, social networking, and mixed reality software. Horizon is a metaverse project on the Meta-owned Oculus platform. Including the Meta name into the branding may indicate a broader movement for the company to open up the metaverse beyond VR.
Meta’s plans for crypto dominance have taken a tumble in recent years. Their stablecoin project, Diem, was a spectacular failure and was sold to Silvergate earlier this year. However, this activity was all done under the Facebook brand. The move to Meta seems to have left some legal loopholes open that the company is now attempting to plug. Yet, a question now arises, “Is Meta simply protecting its IP by trademarking its logo for use in crypto and financial trading, or is there more to it than that?”
Let me know what you think about Meta’s potential moves into crypto exchanges. Do you think it’s going to happen in 2022? What is Meta’s next move in the blockchain space after the failure of Diem? Hit me up on Twitter or via email.
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