Sales volumes of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have surged to USD 10.7 billion in the third quarter of 2021, according to data from market tracker DappRadar.
The third-quarter figure was up from USD 1.3 billion in Q2 and USD 1.2 billion in Q1, Reuters cited DappRadar data. This NFT market's growth might be caused by cryptocurrency price gains during COVID-19, still, NFT enthusiasts say that the crypto assets have value independently of market conditions.
NFTs use blockchain to record the ownership of digital items such as images, videos, collectibles, and even land in virtual worlds. On the biggest NFT marketplace, OpenSea, sales volumes hit USD 3.4 billion in August 2021. Activity remained strong even in September 2021 when global stock markets faltered.
To be sure, estimates for the size of the NFT market vary depending on what is included. Transactions that take place ‘off-chain’, such as NFT art sales at auction houses, are often not captured by the data.
DappRadar’ s numbers, which include multiple blockchains and ‘off-chain’ transactions, put the total 2021 sales volume at USD 13.2 billion. Another market tracker, CryptoSlam, which excludes ‘off-chain’ sales, says the figure is USD 9.6 billion.
The most expensive known NFT sale was a digital collage sold at Christie's for USD 69.3 million in March 2021. One NFT brand to see particularly high growth in Q3 was Art Blocks, a US-based project which sells NFTs of algorithmically generated digital artworks. Gaming-related NFTs also surged, with the blockchain-based game Axie Infinity leading the ‘play-to-earn’ sector with USD 776 million in Q3 revenues, DappRadar said.
Despite growing sales and celebrities and other investors jumping on the trend, the number of NFT buyers remains relatively small: there were just 265,927 active wallets trading NFTs on the Ethereum blockchain in Q3, NonFungible.com said.
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