Mastercard’s NFT lead resigns and turns his resignation letter into an NFT

Mastercard’s NFT product lead Satvik Sethi resigned and minted his resignation letter into an NFT. He broke the news on Feb 2nd on his Twitter handle, where he said he felt neglected by the company and felt it s time to focus on Web3 and creating art full-time.

Satvik indicated that he joined the role in 2021 and is grateful for evangelizing Web3 to Mastercard and Fortune 500 clients and partners.

Taken for granted

Satvik felt taken for granted saying he was a victim of harassment and emotional distress. There were times he experienced mismanaged processes, miscommunication and internal inefficiency. He also complained of being underpaid when he moved to London, where his salary was cut by 30%, turning him into survival mode. Mastercard also blocked him from online accounts. He noted that his resignation has not been an easy one.

Although he has gone through a rough patch with the company, he was still grateful for all the support he got. Although Mastercard is aware of the resignation, it has still not commented on it.

NFT opportunity

As an NFT enthusiast, he decided to turn his resignation letter into an open edition NFT through the digital collectables protocol Manifold. He clarified that the full proceeds from the sale would go to survival. The project dubbed “New Beginnings” was going for $38(0.023 ETH). So far, there are up to 38 NFTs that have been minted, according to Manifold.

With passion and experience, Sethi plans to build Joincircle, his own Web3 social networking and community-building site. He also plans to immerse himself in art and release different art forms fully.

Mastercard has been at the forefront regarding payments, including cryptocurrency payments. In 2022, it embraced NFT payments, and in June 2022, it announced that up to 2.9 billion of its cardholders would be able to buy NFTs directly without having to buy cryptocurrency first. Mastercard recently partnered with Binance to create and launch a prepaid crypto card in Brazil. Mastercard has also partnered with Polygon to launch an artist accelerator to help users mint NFTs.