EBay officially opens its platform to NFT sales

The online sales platform eBay is now permitting the sale of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) for digital collectibles. The company told Reuters that beginning Tuesday an "NFT inventory will be provided to sellers who meet eBay's standards."

Users can bid on NFTs as they would for a physical item. All payments will be made in U.S. dollars — unlike other prominent NFT platforms, which usually accept ether (ETH) for NFT payments.

Many of the NFTs currently available for sale on eBay appear to be on the WAX blockchain, with sellers stipulating that buyers create a WAX wallet in order to receive their NFT. 

The move to allow NFT sales comes a week after the e-commerce firm's CEO Jamie Iannone told CNBC that the company was looking at ways to incorporate NFTs on its platform.

It also appears to be part of a larger plan. "In the coming months, eBay will add new capabilities that bring blockchain-driven collectibles to our platform," Jordan Sweetnam, senior vice president and general manager for eBay's North America market, told Reuters.

About Author

MK Manoylov has been a reporter for The Block since 2020 — joining just before bitcoin surpassed $20,000 for the first time. Since then, MK has written nearly 1,000 articles for the publication, covering any and all crypto news but with a penchant toward NFT, metaverse, web3 gaming, funding, crime, hack and crypto ecosystem stories. MK holds a graduate degree from New York University's Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program (SHERP) and has also covered health topics for WebMD and Insider. You can follow MK on X @MManoylov and on LinkedIn.