Ukraine will soon announce NFTs to support defense against Russia — as crypto donations exceed $50m

• Ukraine said it will soon announce NFTs as part of its crypto fundraising efforts.
• The country has already raised more than $50 million in crypto to help its armed forces against Russia.
• In announcing the NFTs, Ukraine cancelled a planned crypto airdrop.
• For more stories go to www.BusinessInsider.co.za.

Ukraine’s vice prime minister announced on Twitter the country would soon release NFTs to help raise funds for its defense against Russia’s invasion.

In a tweet, Mykhailo Fedoro, who is also the country’s minister of digital transformation, said, “we will announce NFTs to support Ukrainian Armed Forces soon.”

The announcement, which came as Fedoro cancelled a planned crypto airdrop, is the country’s latest attempt to raise money through digital tokens.

To date, Ukraine has raised more than $50 million worth in cryptocurrencies, according to data from Elliptic. The tens of thousands of donations included a $200,000 CryptoPunk NFT and a $5.8 million gift from Polkadot founder Gavin Wood. Donors have been sending crypto in the form of bitcoin, ether, and polkadot, and even meme tokens like dogecoin and digital pieces of art known as NFTs.

On Wednesday, Ukraine announced plans for a promotional airdrop, sending free tokens to people’s crypto wallets. An airdrop, according to CoinDesk, is a marketing tool that distributes tokens to community members in the hopes of more people participating in a crypto project. Fedoro said the airdrop was cancelled “after careful consideration” and said the country has no plans to issue any fungible tokens.

“Every day there are more and more people willing to help Ukraine to fight back the aggression,” he wrote in the tweet.

Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine last week, and the West responded with sanctions on Putin and his economy. Amid the war, Ukraine has seen a flood of donations in the form of fiat currency and cryptocurrency to fund its defense. The two countries are set for a second round of talks on Thursday after Russia captured a major Ukrainian city.

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