A growing number of merchants in the Philippines are adopting Axie Infinity's in-game currency for payments, amid an explosion in the game's popularity in the country.
Mobile game Axie Infinity's reward tokens, known as Smooth Love Potion (SLP), are being used by Filipinos to pay for all sorts of products and services, including sneakers, car servicing, COVID-19 tests, milk tea and dumplings, according to a «Coindesk» report on Friday.
The «play-to-earn» game published by Vietnamese studio Sky Mavis allows players to earn SLP by breeding, battling and trading their non-fungible token (NFT) pets called Axies.
The game is viewed as an income source in developing countries like Brazil, India, Indonesia, the Philippines and Venezuela, according to DappRadar. It has almost half a million daily active users, 60 percent of whom are located in the Philippines.
Everyday Currency
Users make real-world transactions using via Ronin, a dedicated wallet that is a MetaMask for Axie's sidechain that allows users to conduct up to 100 free transactions a day. Merchants either check the conversion rate of SLP on Binance at the point of purchase, or price their goods at a fixed rate.
«The minting and acquisition of SLP has become an everyday task for a lot of people, so it's useful to be able to spend it as an everyday currency,» a merchant that accepts SLP was quoted as saying.
Booming Popularity
According to a separate «Coindesk» report, Axie Infinity's popularity in the Philippines surged amid Coronavirus lockdowns and as more people were stuck at home without jobs.
But even those with work are ditching their daily grind for a career in the metaverse, the report said, citing Luis Buenaventura, co-founder of BloomX crypto exchange, who said the average player can earn 4500 SLP a month ($630).
The market price for platform's governance token AXS has grown from around $3.2 in late June to almost $68 currently, with a daily trading volume of $568 million, according to data from «Coinmarketcap.»
