It does feel like Latinum is very much a MacGuffin for undermining a huge amount of "we have virtually infinite free energy and can replicate anything we need" worldbuilding; they needed a way to make 24th century capitalism seem remotely plausible.

In the 21st century, we can replicate any piece of art endlessly without cost. Yet people still buy bored apes NFTs. Latinum is just space NFTs