Non-fungible tokens: legal issues in an ever-changing ecosystem

Abstract

Non-fungible tokens are one of the most innovative answers to the lack of trustfulness and transparency in the digital world. These share peculiar features that allow them to find application in a wide variety of sectors which may also not be strictly digitalized. However, these tokens are showing several downsides that require an immediate but efficient answer from the EU Lawmaker; nonetheless, under the legislative point of view NFTs have still to be defined and their evolutionary character does not make things simpler. This thesis aims at providing, from an EU perspective, an overview of which are the legislative issues related to these tokens, analyzing the current situation by assessing applicability of already existing pieces of legislation, while keeping an eye on the scenario that may be delineated in the near future.