Metaverse[1] has become a hot topic, especially after Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement around Facebook rebranding some time back. Soon after, Morgan Stanley came out to call it the next big investment[2] vertical.
Currently, there are a number of metaverse tokens in the market that include names like Axie Infinity (AXS), Decentraland (MANA), Enjin Coin (ENJ), and The Sandbox (SAND) in order[3] of their market cap. As per the Crunchbase database[4], metaverse projects added $96 million in various rounds of funding this year.
It is clear that the metaverse is looking like a theme with a lot of future interest. Just earlier this month, Enjin had also announced[5] a $100 million Efinity Metaverse Fund.
Speaking about funds, Grayscale Investments had also launched Grayscale Decentraland Trust in March[6] this year. Its idea was to offer passive investments in MANA[7] in the form of security.
In a recent interview[8] with the Insider, Michael Sonnenshein, CEO of Grayscale stated that he “began to notice the convergence between virtual reality, gaming, and digital assets a couple of years back.”
Since the fund’s inception, it has returned a stellar number[9] of 1200.4%. With $61.3 million in AUM, Sonnenshein has some guidelines before investors deep dive into the ecosystem. For starters, he recommended holding the native currency of an application for exposure.
Moreover, investors need to get educated on the metaverse, he stated[10], adding,
“I think because the idea can be quite abstract, it really comes down to learning.”
Looking at the evolution of metaverse, Sonnenshein recalled the birth of Web 1.0 with a ‘read only’ interface. Then, it moved to Web 2.0 with the limitation of “centralization.” In
