Fidelity Plans Foray Into Web3 With Fresh Patent Filings 

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Fidelity Investments, one of the world’s largest and most popular asset managers, is stepping up its adoption of Web3 with a host of new trademark applications hinting at new products. 

An Encompassing NFT Product Suite 

On Monday, trademark attorney Mike Kondoudis announced on social media that Fidelity had submitted three trademark filings with the United States Patent Trademark Office (USPTO), hinting at offerings of products that tap into the Web3 space. 

According to the fillings, Fidelity is especially focusing on the metaverse, with the company looking to offer different investment services – such as investment management, mutual funds, and financial planning – to people in virtual worlds.

The filings also show that Fidelity is looking to optimize payments in the metaverse, allowing people to pay bills, process fund transfers, and even use credit cards and other financial tools while in the virtual space. This would help to improve virtual world-building and provide a better foundation for transactions and service subscriptions in the metaverse. 

Additional focus points include traditional crypto trading and portfolio management services in the metaverse, educational services such as seminars and workshops targeting investment, financial marketing, and a possible online marketplace for non-fungible tokens (NFTs). While the details are still thin, it appears that Fidelity is planning a massive Web3 rollout that could encompass and target customers at all experience levels.  

Another Wave of Market Adoption

Fidelity’s entry into the Web3 space indicates the company’s broadening acceptance of digital assets. The financial giant has continued to grow its digital asset exposure significantly, providing a broad range of services to its retail and institutional clients who would like to enjoy similar levels of exposure. 

2022 has seen the company make different inroads into the crypto market, starting with its decision to allow companies to include Bitcoin as part of their retirement accounts. Per a Wall Street Journal report, Fidelity introduced these Bitcoin retirement plans, allowing over 23,000 companies associated with it to allocate up to 20% of their employees’ retirement accounts to Bitcoin. 

In September, Galaxy Digital chief executive Mike Novogratz also claimed that Fidelity was looking to offer Bitcoin investment products to its retail investor base, which numbered about 34.4 million at the time. This was a response to a report which claimed that the investment giant was looking to bring Bitcoin into its prime brokerage account and let individual investors trade it directly. 

And, amid the market downturn, Fidelity has committed to growing its crypto capabilities as it prepares for the next possible bull run. In October, a company representative confirmed to Bloomberg that they had begun a new wave of hiring for their Digital Asset Division to beef up the division and take its headcount to about 500 by the end of 2023’s first quarter. 

A search on the company’s job board shows tens of postings for digital asset-related positions. These postings include positions in areas such as business analytics, compliance, blockchain development, accounting and finance, customer services, corporate services, and much more. While most of them are geared toward applicants in the United States, the company representative confirmed that they would also be hiring for roles in the United Kingdom and Ireland. 

Although many companies in the crypto space have cut back on hiring and even laid off some of their employees, Fidelity’s move to bring in new people shows a significant interest in the market from the big-name player. 

About Jimmy Aki PRO INVESTOR

Based in the UK, Jimmy is an economic researcher with outstanding hands-on and heads-on experience in Macroeconomic finance analysis, forecasting and planning. He has honed his skills having worked cross-continental as a finance analyst, which gives him inter-cultural experience. He currently has a strong passion for regulation and macroeconomic trends as it allows him peek under the global bonnet to see how the world works.