Fidelity Investments, a major financial services firm managing $10 trillion in assets, has filed several trademark applications for a wide range of products and services related to crypto-currencies, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and metavers.
Fidelity’s crypto-currency and metaverse trademark applications
Fidelity Investments last week filed three trademark applications with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for a wide range of products and services related to crypto-currencies, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and metavers. Fidelity has $9.6 trillion in assets under administration as of Sept. 30; the financial services firm serves about 40 million individual investors.
Mike Kondoudis, a USPTO-certified trademark attorney, tweeted Monday:
Fidelity has plans for the metaverse! The company has filed 3 trademark applications covering NFTs + NFT marketplaces, metaverse investment services, virtual real estate investing, crypto-currency trading, and more.
The financial services giant’s trademark applications were filed on December 21. Their serial numbers are 97727473, 97727439 and 97727409.
The applications specifically detail a wide range of products and services “in the metaverse and other virtual worlds,” including mutual fund investment services, retirement fund investment services, investment management services, financial planning, securities brokerage services, money management, financial analysis and investment management.
Fidelity is no stranger to the metaverse. In April, the financial services company opened a multilevel learning center called “The Fidelity Stack” in Decentraland. The company also launched an exchange-traded fund (ETF) in the metaverse the same month.
In November, Fidelity Investments began offering commission-free retail trading in bitcoin and ether. However, its subsidiary Fidelity Digital Assets has been offering bitcoin services to institutional investors for several years and recently began offering ether trading. The firm issued a report earlier this year stating, “Bitcoin’s first technological breakthrough was not as a superior payment technology, but as a superior form of currency. As a monetary asset, bitcoin is unique.”
A growing number of major companies are filing trademark applications related to crypto-currencies and metavers with the USPTO. This month, banking giant HSBC filed trademark applications for a range of products related to digital currencies and metavers. In October, Visa, Paypal and Western Union also filed trademark applications related to crypto-currencies. Last month, JPMorgan Chase obtained a wallet mark covering various payment and virtual currency services.