Part IV · 2 — NFTs, RWA and beyond

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Not every token is money. When a token represents a unique item — a work of art, a security, a property, a sensor — the blockchain becomes a registry of ownership and provenance. It is the frontier that links the on-chain to the real world.

2.1 NFT: the non-fungible token

An NFT (Non-Fungible Token) is a unique, indivisible token: unlike a coin (where every unit is identical), each NFT is distinguishable and has an owner recorded on-chain. It serves to represent ownership and provenance of a specific item.

What an NFT really guarantees (and what it does not) is the source of much confusion:

  • It guarantees — who holds that on-chain identifier, publicly and

    transferably, with an immutable provenance history.

  • It does not guarantee (on its own) — that the content (the image, the file)

    is on-chain or immutable; many merely point to a URL. Copyright is a legal layer, separate from ownership of the token.

Canonical cases: CryptoPunks and BAYC (profile collections), generative art (Art Blocks), and ENS (human-readable names like alice.eth for addresses) — perhaps the most useful and lasting use.

2.2 RWA: tokenizing the real world

The use that is maturing fastest is RWA (Real World Assets): representing on-chain an asset from the physical/financial world — treasury bonds, private credit, real estate, commodities. The token becomes a programmable, liquid wrapper around an asset that used to be illiquid and bureaucratic.

The promise: 24/7 settlement, fractionalization (buying 1% of a property), composability with DeFi (using a tokenized bond as collateral). The central challenge is the link to the real world: who guarantees that the token is actually backed? That requires custody, auditing and legal enforcement — the part that cryptography does not solve on its own. It is the bridge between the on-chain record and the legal system.

2.3 GameFi, DePIN and identity

  • GameFi / play-to-earn — games where items are NFTs and the economy is

    on-chain. Its peak (Axie Infinity, 2021) exposed the risk: economies designed for speculation, not fun, tend to collapse when the influx of new players stops.

  • DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks) — using tokens to

    incentivize people to provide real infrastructure: wireless coverage (Helium), storage, mapping, compute. It tokenizes the bootstrap of a physical network.

  • Identity / soulbound — non-transferable tokens tied to a person, for

    credentials and reputation (diplomas, certifications) — the basis of a decentralized identity that cannot be bought.

In all of these, the token is only the record; the real value depends on a layer off the chain (the game being fun, the backing existing, the credential being recognized). The blockchain provides verifiable ownership; the rest is design and law.

Dense reference: CryptoPunks/BAYC, generative art, ENS, GameFi, RWA, DePIN and identity in 10-nft-gamefi-rwa. Next: Tokenomics, bridges and risks — what makes (or breaks) a token ecosystem.