WazirX closes NFT Marketplace due to low traction
Indian crypto exchange WazirX has discontinued its NFT marketplace operations with immediate effect. Currently the WazirX NFT website is showing a message to this effect.
WazirX NFT Sundown
“WazirX NFT Marketplace has sunsetted. You can still trade your NFTs on OpenSea,” the message reader.
In a statement On his website, Wazir said despite creating a “safe and secure” marketplace, the business “didn’t gain much traction.”
“NFTs are decentralized and owners have full control over their assets, which is why they have become so popular. Our users can rest assured that they can continue to hold their NFTs in their wallets and these can be sold on other marketplaces such as OpenSea, says the statement.
A report from Inc42 said that WazirX NFTs have 52,253 items for sale on OpenSea.
No notice, blankets…
The news was received with surprise on social media. Several posts on Twitter pointed to “Zero Alert” and some called it a blanket statement. A Twitter user complained that the NFTs hosted on this platform now won’t fetch anything.
WazirX CEO Nischal Shetty responded to a tweet that called the shutdown of the WazirX NFT marketplace a blanket sweep.
“Rug pull? NFTs have always been under self-custody of those who participate,” he so.
Just a day before WazirX shut down its marketplace, an NFT collection under the brand name Friendsies announced a similar decision to “pause” operations, citing market volatility. The announcement caused fears of a rye pull in the Friendsies community.
India NFT market
The WazirX NFT marketplace was launched in June 2021, followed by several other India-focused NFT platforms by other companies. Some were able to rope in top movie stars to mint their NFTs and the market seemed to be taking off to greater heights, with movie stars and cricket personalities in particular jumping on the NFT bandwagon. But a prolonged bear market and unfriendly regulatory environment appear to have hit the crypto subsector hard.
Technology consultancy Deloitte in its Technology, Media, and Telecommunications (TMT) Predictions 2022, said that the Indian sports and entertainment NFT market will grow to $1 billion in the near future, while the global sports NFT trade will cross $2 billion in 2022.
“With more than 500 million cricket fans in India and Bollywood… a cinema and sports-only NFT marketplace in India has the potential to cross $1 billion in value in the near future,” the Deloitte report said.
