• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Articles
  • News
  • Events
  • Advertize
  • Jobs
  • Courses
  • Contact
  • (0)
  • LoginRegister
    • Facebook
    • LinkedIn
    • RSS
      Articles
      News
      Events
      Job Posts
    • Twitter
Datafloq

Datafloq

Data and Technology Insights

  • Categories
    • Big Data
    • Blockchain
    • Cloud
    • Internet Of Things
    • Metaverse
    • Robotics
    • Cybersecurity
    • Startups
    • Strategy
    • Technical
  • Big Data
  • Blockchain
  • Cloud
  • Metaverse
  • Internet Of Things
  • Robotics
  • Cybersecurity
  • Startups
  • Strategy
  • Technical

NFT sales hit $25 billion in 2021, but growth shows signs of slowing

Reuters / 1 min read.
January 10, 2022
floq.to/QEGcW

By Elizabeth Howcroft

LONDON (Reuters) – From cartoon apes to video clips, sales of NFTs reached some $25 billion in 2021 as the speculative crypto asset exploded in popularity, data from market tracker DappRadar shows, although there were signs of growth slowing towards the end of the year.

Prices of some non-fungible tokens, crypto assets representing a digital item such as an image, video, or even land in virtual worlds, rose so fast last year that speculators sometimes ‘flipped’ them for a profit within days.

The art world has been quick to cash in, with auction houses selling NFTs representing simple cartoons for millions of dollars with no physical objects changing hands. One NFT artwork fetched a record $69.3 million at a Christie’s sale in March.

Meanwhile, some of the world’s top brands, including Coca Cola and Gucci, have also sold NFTs.

NFT sales volume totalled $24.9 billion in 2021, compared to just $94.9 million the year before, DappRadar, said on Monday. DappRadar collects data across ten different blockchains, which are used to record who owns the NFT. (Graphic: NFT sales climb to $11.6 billion in Q4 – DappRadar, https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/xmpjobbnmvr/NFT%20sales%20climb%20to%2011.6%20billion.png)

Estimates of volumes vary by different data provider, depending on what is included. Transactions which take place ‘off-chain‘, such as major NFT art sales at auction houses, are often not captured by the data.

CryptoSlam, which also tracks multiple blockchains, said the 2021 total was $18.3 billion. NonFungible.com, which tracks the ethereum blockchain only, put 2021 sales at $15.7 billion.

This means the money spent on NFTs in 2021 is roughly equivalent to the amount pledged at COP26 to help countries phase out coal, or the funding made available by the World Bank to buy and deploy COVID-19 vaccines.

Sales peaked in August, then declined in September, October and November before picking up again in December, data from the biggest NFT marketplace, OpenSea, showed.

This does not appear to be correlated with fluctuations in the price of cryptocurrencies, which are often used to buy NFTs, as bitcoin and ether rose in the September to November period. (Graphic: NFT sales on OpenSea, https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/dwvkrkkzmpm/NFT%20sales%20on%20OpenSea%20peak%20in%20August.png)

Around 28.6 million wallets traded NFTs in 2021, up from some 545,000 in 2020, DappRadar said.

While some see NFTs as the future of ownership in the online world, buying NFTs as a vote of confidence in the development of “Web3” or the metaverse, others are baffled as to why so much money is being spent on items which do not physically exist.

Just 10% of traders accounted for 85% of all NFT transactions, research published in the journal Nature said. (Graphic: Weekly NFT buyers – NonFungible.com, https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/mypmnbbazvr/Weekly%20NFT%20buyers.png)

While the most expensive known NFT sale was $69.3 million, a common price range was $100 to $1,000, NonFungible.com said.

Prices of the most sought-after NFTs were highly volatile. The average sale price of a CryptoPunk image rose from around $100,000 in July to nearly $500,000 in November. By December it had fallen to around $350,000, CryptoSlam data shows. (Graphic: NFT price ranges, https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/mopanwwwmva/NFT%20price%20ranges.png)

Collectible NFTs were the most popular category, followed by art, NonFungible.com said. Some of the most eye-watering NFT sales have been for land in online metaverse environments.

Virtual real estate investor Republic Realm bought land in the virtual world The Sandbox for $4.3 million in November. (Graphic: Collectible NFTs are most popular, https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/zdpxoqqqovx/Collectible%20NFTs%20are%20most%20popular.png)

(Reporting by Elizabeth Howcroft; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Categories: Uncategorized

About Reuters

Primary Sidebar

E-mail Newsletter

Sign up to receive email updates daily and to hear what's going on with us!

Publish
AN Article
Submit
a press release
List
AN Event
Create
A Job Post

Jobs

  • Software Engineer | South Yorkshire, GB - February 07, 2023
  • Software Engineer with C# .net Investment House | London, GB - February 07, 2023
  • Senior Java Developer | London, GB - February 07, 2023
  • Software Engineer – Growing Digital Media Company | London, GB - February 07, 2023
  • LBG Returners – Senior Data Analyst | Chester Moor, GB - February 07, 2023
More Jobs

Tags

AI Amazon analysis analytics application Artificial Intelligence BI Big Data business China Cloud Companies company crypto customers Data design development digital engineer engineering environment experience future Google+ government Group health information learning machine learning mobile news public research security services share skills social social media software solutions strategy technology

News

  • Adobe pushes Firefly AI into big business, with financial cover
  • Microsoft, Google strategy to test AI search ads irks some brands
  • KKR, CDP rival consortium readying new bids for Telecom Italia’s grid
  • Senators ask U.S. Justice Dept to probe Binance statements to Congress
  • EU approves $8.7 billion of state aid for tech innovation projects
More News

Related Online Courses

  • Oracle Cloud Data Management Foundations Workshop
  • Data Science at Scale
  • Statistics with Python
More courses

Footer


Datafloq is the one-stop source for big data, blockchain and artificial intelligence. We offer information, insights and opportunities to drive innovation with emerging technologies.

  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Recent

  • 5 Reasons Why Modern Data Integration Gives You a Competitive Advantage
  • 5 Most Common Database Structures for Small Businesses
  • 6 Ways to Reduce IT Costs Through Observability
  • How is Big Data Analytics Used in Business? These 5 Use Cases Share Valuable Insights
  • How Realistic Are Self-Driving Cars?

Search

Tags

AI Amazon analysis analytics application Artificial Intelligence BI Big Data business China Cloud Companies company crypto customers Data design development digital engineer engineering environment experience future Google+ government Group health information learning machine learning mobile news public research security services share skills social social media software solutions strategy technology

Copyright © 2023 Datafloq
HTML Sitemap| Privacy| Terms| Cookies

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • WhatsApp

In order to optimize the website and to continuously improve Datafloq, we use cookies. For more information click here.

settings

Dear visitor,
Thank you for visiting Datafloq. If you find our content interesting, please subscribe to our weekly newsletter:

Did you know that you can publish job posts for free on Datafloq? You can start immediately and find the best candidates for free! Click here to get started.

Not Now Subscribe

Thanks for visiting Datafloq
If you enjoyed our content on emerging technologies, why not subscribe to our weekly newsletter to receive the latest news straight into your mailbox?

Subscribe

No thanks

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.

Marketing cookies

This website uses Google Analytics to collect anonymous information such as the number of visitors to the site, and the most popular pages.

Keeping this cookie enabled helps us to improve our website.

Please enable Strictly Necessary Cookies first so that we can save your preferences!