UK's Big Crypto Push Includes Minting Its Own NFT

The U.K.'s top regulator has been cracking the whip on crypto companies, but the government just sent a strong message on its blockchain game plan: The British are coming. The U.K. government on Monday unveiled a big push into crypto, including a plan to mint its own NFT. From a report: "I am announcing today that the Chancellor has asked the Royal Mint to create a non-fungible token -- an NFT... to be issued by the Summer, an emblem of the forward-looking approach we are determined to take," John Glen, economic secretary to the Treasury, said in a speech. The announcement was part of an ambitious plan to "make the U.K. a global hub for crypto-asset technology" and "to ensure firms can invest, innovate and scale up in this country," Rishi Sunak, chancellor of the Exchequer, also said in a statement.

I am actually baffled.

[PCM2]

I am totally baffled. Seriously. The UK is a nation-state, one that has its own central bank. It has an actual mint. It doesn't need crypto coins, it can make real coins out of metal! And real pounds sterling! What is this even about?

Re:

[waspleg]

Politicians are largely grifters. I know nothing about English politics but I bet they're involved.

Re:

[splutty]

Probably a late April Fool's that got picked up by some Cryptobro publication :P

Re: I am actually baffled.

[m3n4c3]

Emperors new clothes and all thatâ¦

Re:

[Finallyjoined!!!]

And the date is?

I usually shut down my internet access to avoind this shite, Doh! forgot!

Re: I am actually baffled.

[m3n4c3]

Ahh very trueâ¦! Gotta get back to shopping for rainbow paint I got recommended a few days ago

Re:

[Roger W Moore]

And the date is?

The 4th April - the Independent [independent.co.uk] is carrying the story as well. It just goes to prove that modern British politics is indistinguishable from an April fool's prank.

Re: I am actually baffled.

[Roger W Moore]

Emperors new clothes and all that

Only if the emperor was planning on selling his new clothes to idiots willing to buy them and then use the money to reduce taxes or improve services. Effectively taxing greed and stupidity is not a bad strategy especially when you get to both at once!

Convenient way to loot the treasury.

[rsilvergun]

that would be my guess.

Re:

[Virtucon]

You get an NFT and you get an NFT!

Makes sense

[Roger W Moore]

it can make real coins out of metal! And real pounds sterling!

Yes but metal costs money. NFTs are way cheaper to produce - all you need is a link to say an image of the Queen - and idiots will apparently line up to pay you good money (made of real pounds sterling/dollars/euros etc) for it.

So why not do this? At least then some of the money removed from these idiots will support important things like the NHS, schools, the police, scientific research, parties at Downing Street etc.

Re:

[Powercntrl]

Yes but metal costs money. NFTs are way cheaper to produce - all you need is a link to say an image of the Queen - and idiots will apparently line up to pay you good money (made of real pounds sterling/dollars/euros etc) for it.

If you're doing it on the Ethereum blockchain, it costs real money to mint an NFT. The whole point of NFTs is Ethereum HODLers creating the appearance of an NFT gold rush, so they get to make money selling supplies (in this case, Ethereum which goes *poof* when minted into an NFT) to the would-be gold miners.

Re:

[AmiMoJo]

I thought it was a bit late for April Fools. Turns out it's some half arsed attempt to look hip and cool. Brexit is taking financial services away from London, so they are looking for new stuff they can replace them with. Maybe some environmentally insane scam crypto metadata?

NFTs

[baomike]

I would so like a British Non Fungible Trinket.

Wind power plan revealed

[Yo,dog!]

Is this the purpose of UK's investment in wind power then? Not to save the planet but to rip off the populace.

Newb question

[timeOday]

What's the difference between an NFT, and an individual unit of a cryptocurrency? Or put another way, what's the difference between bitcoin vs. 21 million NFTs (the total number of bitcoins that can exist)?

None

[nocoiner]

What's the difference between an NFT, and an individual unit of a cryptocurrency? Or put another way, what's the difference between bitcoin vs. 21 million NFTs (the total number of bitcoins that can exist)?

None, in that they're both scams.

Re:

[FuzzMaster]

One word: fungibility.

Re:

[Powercntrl]

Bitcoin and various forks that haven't bothered to change the secret sauce are divisible down to one Satoshi (0.00000001 BTC). I guess they figure they'll run out of suckers before there'd be any need to divide it further ("but I wanted to see quantum realm BTC!").

A NFT is always one NFT. I suppose you could barter with them the same as anything else, but their value is even more subjective than cryptocurrency. Funny thing is, most NFTs aren't even worth the Ethereum it cost to originally mint them (and

Re:

[MarkUltraBlack]

You know, it seems to me that in the case of NFT, the situation is the same as it once was with cryptocurrency. At first we are skeptical and with great distrust, but then we accept something new and begin to actively develop in it. At first I didn’t understand anything either, then I found TopNFTCollections [topnftcollections.com] to look at various top nft collections, read more information about nft. Now I think this is a great opportunity to support artists and invest money.

re:

[MarkUltraBlack]

Well, crypto is getting pretty popular, and I believe that in the nearest future, more stores will accept it as a payment method. And even nowadays, many people manage to profit from it by trading, and tools like Bitcode AI [thebitcode.ai] make it even easier, so I believe that this technology has the brightest future, but I'm not that sure about NFTs.