Coinbase is required by Apple to disable NFT transfers in its wallet app

NFT transactions are no longer supported by Coinbase’s Wallet iOS app as a result of Apple’s rigorous new NFT restrictions, which were revealed in October.

“You may have noticed that NFTs can no longer be sent on the iOS version of Coinbase Wallet. This is due to Apple preventing our most recent app release until we turned off the feature”, the Coinbase Wallet account tweeted on Thursday.

NFTs are subject to a steep 30% transaction tax on Apple’s mobile app store, even if they aren’t officially forbidden. Developers will have their apps removed from the store if they are unable to comply with that criterion.

According to Coinbase, Apple wants to charge a 30% fee on any gas fees (i.e., fees associated with Ethereum network transactions) associated with NFT transfers carried out through the wallet app, but Coinbase claims that this is “impossible.”

This is obviously not conceivable, according to anyone who is familiar with how blockchains and NFTs operate, according to Coinbase. Even if we wanted to, we couldn’t comply because Apple’s proprietary In-App Purchase mechanism doesn’t handle cryptocurrency.

Gas fees cannot be taxed

A price known as gas is charged for each transaction a user does on the Ethereum network, even if they are just moving an asset like an NFT to another wallet. The network cannot function without these fees. However, they are more intricate than a flat rate and are not under the jurisdiction of a single organization.

The cost of gas, which is measured in gwei but paid for in ETH, varies according to the activity on the Ethereum network and the effectiveness of a smart contract’s code. Additionally, more experienced users can choose to pay more to move their transaction up the list.

These limitations on its mobile application have angered Coinbase, which compares Apple’s action to “Apple wanting to take a piece of fees for every email that gets sent via open Internet protocols.”

Many proponents of cryptocurrencies are outraged by Apple’s contentious in-app purchase tax, including Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games, who previously filed a lawsuit to challenge Apple’s policies and declared that the tech giant “must be stopped.”

Ryan Wyatt, a former executive at YouTube and the current CEO of Polygon Studios, has adopted a similar approach and has called Apple’s 30% tax “criminal.” According to Wyatt, the tax’s monopoly on the sector will “forever hold back technical advancement.”

Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Twitter, earlier expressed worries that Apple would remove Twitter from its store (Musk later met with Apple CEO Tim Cook on Wednesday, and Cook reportedly allayed Musk’s worries).

Good conversation. Among other things, we resolved the misunderstanding about Twitter potentially being removed from the App Store. Tim was clear that Apple never considered doing so.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 30, 2022

Coinbase expressed the expectation that this choice was perhaps “an oversight” and that it can be further examined. Additionally, it thinks that Apple’s stringent NFT fee policy would make it more challenging for NFTs to gain widespread adoption and will make it more difficult for customers to transfer their assets.

At the expense of customer investment in NFTs and developer innovation throughout the crypto ecosystem, Apple has implemented new regulations to safeguard corporate revenues, according to Coinbase.

Crypto aficionados on Twitter today criticized Apple’s limitations, but others highlighted the possibilities of Solana’s Saga phone, a mobile device that is Web3-native and will not have such limitations. This device is still under development. Its projected release date right now is early in the next year.

According to Solana’s Head of Communications Austin Federa, “Today it was Apple, but tomorrow it may be Google.” “We require a third choice.”

Related

• Coinbase Exchange Review – Features, Fees, Pros & Cons 2022
• Coinbase Alternatives: 9 Platforms with Lower Fees and More Security
• Apple clarifies App Store rules on NFTs and crypto exchanges