Ukraine sells donated CryptoPunk for US$ 100,000 to support war effort

The Ukraine government’s crypto fundraising campaign Aid for Ukraine just sold CryptoPunk #5364 NFT, which was received as a donation in early March during its fundraising campaign in its war against Russia.

Alex Bornyakov, Ukraine’s deputy minister of digital transformation, announced the sale via Twitter on Monday. Bornyakov is responsible for monitoring crypto fundraising during the country’s ongoing war. 

Yesterday, an anonymous buyer bagged the NFT for 90 ETH, the equivalent of US$ 100,000 at the time of writing. The NFT’s value was estimated to be at US$ 260,000 before the price of ETH’s sharp decline in early March. 

In March, a crypto group raised US$ 6.75 million via a sale of an NFT of the Ukrainian flag. A few weeks ago, the Ukrainian rap group Kalush Orchestra, this year’s Eurovision champions, put their music competition trophy up for auction to raise nearly US$ 1 million in ETH for the fund.

The funds, managed by Ukranian crypto exchange Kuna, are used to fund non-lethal weapons for Ukraine’s military, including bulletproof vests and medical supplies. The funds are not held or used by the Ukrainian government, who only oversees the project. 

Since Ukraine’s wallet went live in February, it has raised over US$ 135 million in crypto donations.

Ukraine’s use of crypto and NFTs for fundraising is serving as a case study for the potential benefits of using crypto in wartime conflicts when fiat currency is difficult to transfer and access quickly and to circumnavigate other financial restrictions.  

Photo: OpenSea