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Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are making headlines everywhere, from niche crypto forums to traditional news sites. In fact, NFTs are achieving what even Bitcoin has struggled to do in twelve years: they are managing to bring the world of cryptocurrency mainstream. Today, we are seeing names as big as Visa (V), Nike (NKE) and Adidas (ADDYY) making forays into the NFT space. 

As their popularity continues to explode, will NFTs pave the way to continued adoption of digital assets?

The Intersection of Identity, Culture, and Fashion 

It has always been in our nature to seek out new technologies that we can leverage to broaden our social signaling and expand our affinity groups. Money makes the world go round, but human culture has wings and wants to fly above it all.

Bitcoin (BITCOMP) has made slow and steady progress over the past twelve years in terms of mainstream adoption and practical use cases. But Bitcoin’s growth curve has been dwarfed by public interest in NFTs, going from a mostly unknown technology to dominating the cultural zeitgeist of today in less than one year. How did this happen and where is it going?

Rapid growth is happening because NFTs exist at the intersection of identity, culture and fashion. Sharing that you own a particular NFT (such as using it as your Twitter PFP) is a form of social signaling similar to wearing a particular brand of sneakers or walking around with your favorite band’s name on your T-shirt. As human beings, we’ve always enjoyed sharing what we like with other people. It’s how we identify and meet people who share similar interests and how we expand our social network of like-minded friends.  

Digital Social Signaling 

The difference with NFTs is that this signaling has moved completely into the digital realm. And it goes beyond simply displaying JPEG images on a screen. NFTs exist on a blockchain and are secured by cryptography, meaning any owner of a NFT has incontrovertible proof that they own it. By clicking a simple “connect wallet” button on a typical web3-enabled website, a NFT owner can use their NFT as a “membership card,” gaining access to members only resources both online and in the physical world.

This intersection between identity, culture, and fashion is why brands like Dolce & Gabbana, Nike, and Adidas are jumping into the NFT space. They understand how to drive cultural interest in their brands and see the future of social signaling in digital realms can dovetail with physical world fashion culture.  

NFTs Take Data to a New Level

We must remember that any kind of data whatsoever can be embedded in a NFT. Official government records, deeds and titles, provenance documentation, and any tokenized security you can imagine. By existing as non-fungible tokens on a cryptographically secure blockchain, these assets are not only digitized but completely trackable and unforgeable. And, their digital rights management around transactions like transfers and royalties are 100 percent controlled by the users who create them.

Digital currency like Bitcoin and other unique use-case cryptocurrencies will provide the rails for how we move value around the world in the future. But the future of NFTs and digital assets is even bigger, tightly bound with how we as unique individuals wish to see ourselves and how we wish to be seen by others.

In the future, big brands will inevitably include NFTs in their customer engagement and business strategies. The big winners will be companies that offer novel and compelling utility to customers in the form of NFT membership perks, leverage people’s strong desire to expand their social groups via social signaling, and dovetail NFT offerings with existing physical world fashion items in a way that is complementary. We’ll also see more novel financial instruments based on different blockchains that are geared towards ordinary savers and not professional investors. Digital assets that offer a simple path to high yields (such as ndau’s (NDAU-X) 25 percent returns for 3-year locked accounts) will give people brand new ways to combat inflation and reliably grow their wealth over time.