Switzerland’s national postal office is attempting to bridge the gap between real stamps and the digital cryptocurrency market. The new crypto stamp is a digital collectible linked to a traditional physical stamp issued by the Swiss Post.
The Swiss Post officially announced the imminent launch of the “Swiss crypto stamp,” a digital collectible tied to a real stamp worth 8.9 francs that will be produced by the postal service.
The Swiss crypto stamp will be kept on a blockchain and will serve as a digital representation of a physical stamp. Through a QR code placed next to the physical stamp, buyers will be able to find a digital twin of their physical stamp online.
The image of the crypto stamp will be one of 13 possible designs, and it will be available for collection, exchange, and trading online, according to the Swiss Post.
Because some of the stamps will have an uncommon design, the future Swiss crypto stamp is expected to deliver an experience akin to nonfungible tokens (NFT).
“Some are more common, while others are quite uncommon and much sought after. The most common digital design has 65,000 copies, whereas the rarest has only 50.
One thing is certain: the Swiss crypto stamp signifies that stamp collecting, exchanging, and trading has also gone digital,” according to the Swiss Post.
The Swiss crypto stamp will be available in late November, with 175,000 stamps arriving at Swiss Post outlets on November 25. The Swiss crypto stamp, according to the statement, will be the first of its kind to be released in Switzerland.
Switzerland is far from the first jurisdiction to use blockchain technology to create digital stamp collectibles. In May 2021, Austria’s postal office revealed that its Crypto Stamp 3.0, the third generation of its limited-edition NFT postage stamp collector series, would have NFC chips. In 2019, Austria issued its first crypto stamp.
