Main topic: Decline in NFT sales and the need for new opportunities in the sector.
Key points:
- NFT sales in July totaled $495.6 million, down 23% from June.
- This marks the fifth consecutive month of declining NFT sales since February.
- The average sale in July was just $47, indicating less interest in high-value NFTs.
- Transaction levels remain high, indicating a growing prevalence of low-barrier NFT sales.
- Ethereum, Bitcoin, and Solana were the top blockchains for NFT sales in the past 30 days.
- The decline in NFT sales highlights the need for players and builders in the sector to find new growth opportunities.
Recur, an NFT platform that featured collectibles from popular brands, is shutting down due to challenges and changes in the business landscape, causing a decline in the value of its offerings. Users can still access their NFTs through IPFS, but the company will disable deposits and gradually take its websites offline. This closure follows a trend in the NFT community, as other platforms have also shut down recently.
Recursive inscriptions on Bitcoin's blockchain, known as Ordinals, are being hailed as a powerful development that could enable more complex functionality, similar to smart contracts on Ethereum, creating a full-blown DeFi ecosystem on Bitcoin and potentially competing with decentralized storage provider IPFS. These developments are sparking renewed interest in Bitcoin and attracting a wave of developers eager to explore the possibilities of this new technology.
Bitcoin Ordinal sales volumes have allegedly dropped 97% from May to August, leading to speculation about the decline of Ordinals, but some in the community are pushing back against the accuracy of the report and pointing out discrepancies in the data provided by different sources.
Summary: The Nifty Newsletter highlights the launch of decentralized social media platform Frend.tech with over 100,000 users, OpenSea disabling its on-chain royalty enforcement tool, Sotheby's and Yuga Labs facing a lawsuit from Bored Ape investors, a significant decline in Bitcoin Ordinals NFT trading volume, and the collapse of the "charitable" NFT project Orica.
Renowned author Nassim Nicholas Taleb has predicted the downfall of Bitcoin, stating that its eventual demise will be due to "inexorable decay" rather than a crash, highlighting concerns about dwindling interest and market manipulation.
