NFT Trading Volumes Collapse 97% From January Peak (bloomberg.com) 59
Trading volumes in nonfungible tokens -- digital art and collectibles recorded on blockchains -- have tumbled 97% from a record high in January this year. From a report: They slid to just $466 million in September from $17 billion at the start of 2022, according to data from Dune Analytics. The fading NFT mania is part of a wider, $2 trillion wipeout in the crypto sector as rapidly tightening monetary policy starves speculative assets of investment flows.
To the surpise of no-one (Score:5, Insightful)
To the surprise of utterly no-one - except the last in line of the "greater fool" theory of NFT sales.
Re:To the surpise of no-one (Score:4, Informative)
We're not at the end of the line yet, there was still $466 million in trades this month.
Re:To the surpise of no-one (Score:5, Insightful)
We're not at the end of the line yet, there was still $466 million in trades this month.
How many of those trades were the NFT owner selling from one wallet they owned to another to create a fictitious history of value?
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Ahhh, I remember the good old days of Ebay sellers buying their own items to inflate prices.
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Or at least as commonly, them completing a zero-sum transaction/smart-contract (or whatever the technical term is) where nothing even changes hands at the end of the transaction besides a few dollars in fees.
As I understand it they list an NFT for $5mm then, in a single smart contract, borrow the $5mm, buy the NFT, from themself to themself, and return the $5mm plus a small transaction/interest fee.
Now that NFT has a $5mm sale transaction on the blockchain ... tadaa. Instead of asking how many trades were
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Nope.
They just retreated and will come at the next ponzi scheme spurred on by the sunken cost fallacy. It's nature's way.
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Re: To the surpise of no-one (Score:1)
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Who are the remaining 3% - all the scam marketers and tech writers?
As quantaman [slashdot.org] suggested above, people moving things between wallets to give the illusion of activity.
Should have listened to the elders in tech. (Score:4, Insightful)
The elders in tech all said it was a scam. And they didn't listen, so now they get to lose everything.
Re:Should have listened to the elders in tech. (Score:4, Informative)
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The 'elders' may have gotten it right, but they also got it wrong.
Plenty of people made LOTS of money...and had the elders applied their wisdom a bit more carefully they, too, could have made a lot of money but also known when to cash out.
WFSL (Score:5, Funny)
Hm (Score:5, Funny)
I'm sure glad I paid $60 million for a 128 x 128 pixel gif of a gorilla before the prices collapsed. Now I have a story to tell my grandkids about why they have no inheritance. They'll get to learn valuable life lessons like self reliance, bad luck, and an intimate understanding of systemic class oppression.
Worse than that (Score:2)
I'm sure glad I paid $60 million for a 128 x 128 pixel gif of a gorilla before the prices collapsed.
You actually paid 60 million for a *link* to a 128x128 gif that may not even be valid any more! Hope you backed up the image somewhere just like anyone else could have done.
Re: I'm liking this (Score:2)
I *hate* to tell you, but it ain't just the rich getting fleeced, pal
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I personally like the fact that annoying crap like stocks, crypto and NFT are collapsing. I even like the raising interest rates. All of the collateral noise (Insane energy consumption, skyrocketing GPU pricing) generated by doing nothing constructive other than fleecing the rich going away I think is a net positive.
I look forward to the trend continuing and these bottom feeding activities shriveling and dying.
I *hate* to tell you, but it ain't just the rich getting fleeced, pal
It's not even the rich getting fleeced.
Stocks are owned largely by middle class folk as part of their retirement packages. The truly rich own things which are unique and have absolute utility like land or livestock.
Hodl (Score:5, Funny)
shocked (Score:4, Funny)
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The posters who used to say BTC was trouncing USD, beating it like an unwanted stepchild, are mighty quiet these days.
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The posters who used to say BTC was trouncing USD, beating it like an unwanted stepchild, are mighty quiet these days.
Yeah, where did they all go?
They must still be around here somewhere and we need their insights to help us understand BTC more than ever.
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It might actually be useful to track them to see where the next global scam is.
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That'd be my BiL. If it's a risky thing to invest in, he's into it.
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Re: shocked (Score:1)
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Maybe because literally nobody wants a 20.000x deflation?
Re: shocked (Score:2)
still $466 million? (Score:2)
Wtf? That is still about 100 000 times too high.
Paying say 1-10 $ to be associated with some funny picture, ok, people can have that as a fairly harmless hobby.
But the prices people paid and apparently still pay based on that sum is just a reminder that a fool and his money will soon be parted.
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That's just selling 1 NFT to yourself for 1M 466 times.
Re:still $466 million? (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
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Wtf? That is still about 100 000 times too high.
Paying say 1-10 $ to be associated with some funny picture, ok, people can have that as a fairly harmless hobby.
But the prices people paid and apparently still pay based on that sum is just a reminder that a fool and his money will soon be parted.
The NFT people make the Magic The Gathering people look like normal, healthy human beings.
At least with Magic The Gathering you actually own the cards you paid for.
Re: still $466 million? (Score:2)
This is much more like Beanie Babies, or Franklin Mint collectibles.
Ain't nothin' to be done with them.
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Say it with me now, everybody.... (Score:2)
To the MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!
Except the rocket never made it out of the atmosphere.
Wrong topic, this is not the SLS topic (Score:2)
Maybe we should paste some Bored Ape pics on that SLS rocket to at least make it look like the joke that it is.
well after all they were merely bored (Score:2)
A long way of saying "morons got edumacated" (Score:1)
"rapidly tightening monetary policy starved speculative assets of investment flows"
Hahahahahaha, you SCHMUCKS !
Schadenfreude (Score:3)
Quite an arc, really (Score:4, Interesting)
NFTs weren't invented by Beeple, but he really blew the whole thing wide open. What some people didn't understand is that Beeple had previously spent 10 years doing online art, was skilled at using production tools, and had a unique sort of surreal style that was legitimately appealing (at least to some people) as art.
ie, you weren't going to just snap your fingers and make $millions unless you were either talented or... lucky. The less creative stuff like "crypto punks" was really just in the right place, at the right time, and happened to hit upon something that could go viral. If there was any skill there at all, it was in understanding the memetic conversation and tapping in to it--Bored Ape Yacht Club was the prime example of that, and there were a few others.
If you happened to latch on to the right theme (whales, apes, diamonds, etc.) and commissioned art that was OK, *and* it captured the imagination then you won the lottery.
So of course there were going to be millions of other people that would try, and most of them would have no talent and no luck. Even some of that junk might sell in a bull market until people realized how much there was and so here we are.
It was an interesting show, and I too watched it from the sidelines because when people start talking about markets going "parabolic", at least they are honest in some sense because a parabola has two sides. Another name for parabola is "ballistic trajectory". BOOM!
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Aha! (Score:2)
I should sell some NFTs of Tulip Bulbs [wikipedia.org]!
Assuming God doesn't exist (Score:1)
and there isn't any eternal punishment for running a scam like this...the average B-school prick is still left with the following quandry: do I double down on the corporate resources spent on my crazy marketing stunt of embedding crypto tokens into fast food ordering apps, and claim success, or do I skedaddle as fast as I can, legally change my name, and try to do it to another company?
It was a tax scam (Score:5, Interesting)
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I remember seeing the explanation for how the scam worked, but had not heard of it being closed.
See Youtube -> Wendover Productions -> The Art Market is a Scam (And Rich People Run It)
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Which is why the folks who invest in art as an investmen
Anybody wants a Bored Ape pic ? Nobody? (Score:2)
I invested all my life savings including my dog's retirement plan in a picture of a uninterested looking monkey picking his nose.
Well, not the picture, only the link to that picture.
Maybe I can make an NFT of the link to double my investment return.
In other news ... (Score:2)
Sales of the Brooklyn Bridge soar.
There's always another sucker.
The peak happened in late April / early May (Score:2)
NFTs are the future (Score:2)
...of bankruptcies.
Once upon a time there were crypto kitties. People paid thousands and even tens of thousands for them. Remember those? No?! Well there's a reason for that!
Only 97%? (Score:1)
cool stats (Score:2)
Next, can we get some stats on Enron's economic activity, and how many new customers Madoff got this month?
Because... (Score:2)
Who needs these things? While the world is certainly full of idiots, the number of rich idiots is quite small.