Editor’s note: Following today’s post we will be expanding our weekly reporting to include a Monday morning look-ahead and a Friday afternoon round-up to better keep our readers informed on the latest happenings in the metaverse and NFT economy. We will continue to publish the Metanomics Weekly each week aiming for a mid-week release. Over the next month we are also adding a number of monthly reports targeted towards specific areas of the metaverse economy including economic updates on the NFT, play-to-earn gaming, and digital real estate markets.
The Weekly Take
With the recently announced $450 million raised by Yuga Labs (at a $4 billion valuation) you could be forgiven for being surprised that we are in the midst of a crypto art winter. Monthly volume across major crypto-art platforms fell significantly in 2022. Whereas collectibles have seen over $4 billion in sales in 2022 - looking like the best three-month stretch on record - sales of fine art has struggled to reach the $100 million per month mark across the major fine art platforms at any point in 2022.
While $100 million per month in sales volume (unthinkable even just 18 months ago) hardly spells the death of crypto art, the divergence of the art and collectibles market does point to a larger trend. The market is increasingly valuing the fungibility of non-fungible tokens.
Following the success of the Bored Ape Yacht Club membership and airdrop model (where current holders received free claims to additional NFTs, the $ape token, and potentially land in their upcoming metaverse) the most successful NFTs today tend to rely less on the art or traits of any particular token and more on the exposure to the project as whole. The social nature of NFTs has turned the tokens into club memberships making the tokens themselves nearly interchangeable. In the face of this, it is becoming increasingly hard for collectors to justify the prices asked for 1 of 1s and low editions on the premise that “the utility is the art” when collectors can quickly check comparables in the physical art world. Community is becoming key.
Crypto artists with previous 1 of 1 and low-edition success are adapting to this shift. XCOPY recently earned over $20 million dollars selling nearly 7500 identical editions over a 10 minute period massively expanding the collector base. FEWOCiOUS has announced FEWO WORLD for FEWOCiOUS holders. Micah Johnson is producing an avatar collection called Akutars based on his Aku Dreams series. Josie Bellini has already successfully launched CyberBrokers. While digital art will always have a home with NFTs, growth will inevitably come from leveraging its key advantage of building online communities.
The Metaverse News
173,600 ether and 25.5 million in USDC was stolen in a hack of the Ronin Bridge last week with the validators only discovering the missing funds Tuesday. The Ronin blockchain hosts the transactions of the popular Axie Infinity play-to-earn game by Sky Mavis. The hack involved the compromising of five of the nine validators used to confirm transactions on the bridge. The funds have not yet been recovered.
Visa launched an NFT creator program to support NFT artists and connect them to what they say is a growing list of merchants and brands trying to enter the NFT space. Visa has shown consistent interest in the space, first buying a CryptoPunk last summer for over $150,000 for their corporate collection of financial artefacts. This move is part of their larger focus to provide payments services across all NFT markets allowing individuals to buy NFTs using their credit cards instead of the cumbersome process of transacting directly on the blockchain.
The world’s highest selling living artist, Jeff Koons, is creating an NFT. According to the artist, he is going to launch a set of sculptures into space with the goal of landing them on the surface of the moon. Associated to each sculpture will be an NFT. While it is not the first NFT to venture to space and many physical art pieces have been tokenized, it is the first piece to be sent to the moon.
What To Look For
Thursday, April 7th:
3pm EST - Metanomics Spaces #5 with Aku Dreams artist Micah Johnson
Nameless makes no warranty, guarantee, or representation as to the accuracy or sufficiency of the information featured in Metanomics. The information, opinions, and recommendations presented in Metanomics are for general information only and any reliance on the information provided in Metanomics is done at your own risk. The information provided by Metanomics should not be construed as financial, legal, or business advice, or professional advise of any kind.
The author may be an investor in one or more of the companies, investment products, or NFT projects mentioned in this article.