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Tencent’s non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace Huanhe says it will allow buyers to refund purchased NFTs but will no longer issue the digital assets, citing a “focus on the company’s core strategic considerations.”
Fast facts
- The marketplace’s app will remain, but it will only allow existing customers to “display, download and share” NFTs they already own, a company announcement said.
- However, Tencent is not planning to lay off Huanhe team members, Chinese media The Paper cited from an internal source, although a previous report in July said that Tencent has notified junior managers to prepare for a layoff.
- Tencent is considering expanding overseas to make an NFT marketplace for users outside of China, as reported by local Chinese media in July.
- After going live in August 2021, Huanhe was active for less than a year until its last batch of NFTs were released in early July.
- Huanhe is one of the few platforms that never allowed NFT secondary transactions as a means of banning speculation, and the low liquidity of NFTs may have contributed to the slow sales that the platform experienced since June.
- WeChat, a popular instant messaging platform in China developed by Tencent, banned a batch of public accounts of NFT platforms in March and June, stating the accounts “violated the national ban on cryptocurrency speculation” as Chinese authorities have been constantly warning against NFT hype.