Telegram CEO Teases NFT Conversion Feature for Gifts

• Telegram CEO has announced an upcoming NFT conversion feature.
• The functionality will apply to certain Gifts within the messaging app.
• Durov said users could auction converted NFTs outside Telegram.

Telegram CEO Pavel Durov has revealed that the instant messaging platform will soon integrate a feature for converting limited-edition gifts to TON-based non-fungible tokens (NFTs).  

The move came amid a declining NFT market, which recorded its lowest monthly sales volume since January 2021 in September. NFT sales last month totaled $296 million while the number of transactions involving these tokens fell from 7.3 million in August to 4.9 million last month, underscoring their dwindling popularity.

Telegram Embraces NFTs

According to Durov’s announcement , Telegram launched Gifts on October 5, allowing users to leverage them to congratulate their loved ones on important events. Gift recipients can display them on their profiles or sell them for Stars, Telegram’s in-app currency that can be used to pay for digital services.

Some of these gifts will have a limited supply, enhancing their rarity.

“Later this year we’ll introduce the ability to convert these limited-edition gifts into TON-based NFTs. Users will then be able to auction and trade these tokenized gifts outside Telegram, with ownership recorded on the blockchain.” Durov stated.

In a follow-up post on October 6, Durov announced that two limited-edition gifts that were launched on Saturday sold out in a “few hours.” This included the entire supply of 500,000 lollipops and 100,000 cherry blossoms.

Noting that the Telegram team didn’t expect this to happen “so fast,” Durov said the messaging platform was working on an update to better handle sold-out items. He then asked users whether Telegram should release more limited-edition gifts in a poll, in which over 33,000 people had voted yes at the time of writing.

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