Metaversal is a Bankless newsletter for weekly level-ups on NFTs, virtual worlds, & collectibles

Dear Bankless Nation,

The NFT space is incredibly multidisciplinary. 

There are so many different verticals here, from analytics to wallets, as NFTs lie at the intersection of so many different fields like art, computer science, cryptography, economics, finance, history, the humanities, mathematics, philosophy, politics, and more.

You don’t have to master every branch of the NFT skill tree, of course. Even just steadily progressing along in the areas you like most will help you hone a more multidisciplinary perspective going forward, and that will undoubtedly prove invaluable as this ecosystem continues to expand and become more complicated and varied over time. 

For now, though, I hope you all just have a fantastic weekend. Let’s dive in and catch you up on the past week’s biggest NFT developments ✌️

-WMP

🙏 Sponsor: Kraken — the most trusted and secure crypto exchange in the world ✨

🧠 The big picture

The cumulative market cap of the NFT space has continued its upward trend for the 7th consecutive week. This week, the market cap climbed from 9.46M ETH to 10.02M ETH, marking a 6% increase since the previous Friday recap. This rise in market cap comes after the NFT ecosystem just had its best 7-day weekly volume statistics since May 2022, signaling increased activity and demand.

📊 This week by the numbers:

Last week, the leading blue-chip PFP collections contributed nearly 150k ETH to the NFT trading volume statistics. Among them, BAYC, MAYC, and Azuki experienced decent increases in floor prices, while MAYC, BAKC, and Moonbirds all recorded more than 2,000 sales over the week.

🔝 7D top collections by volume

🛒 7D NFT marketplace stats

Once again, Blur continues to dominate NFT trading volume levels. According to the graph below, the platform currently represents roughly 80% of the ecosystem’s 7-day trading volume, with OpenSea trailing far behind at approximately 18%. This overwhelming activity on Blur is, of course, largely attributable to the ongoing scramble to earn $BLUR Season 2 rewards.

🛍️ 3 biggest buys this week

There were no sales of ‘Punks or Apes in the top three largest transactions this week, but that wasn’t for a lack of major activity. On Monday, Fortnite esports professional and Yuga Labs’s “Dookey Dash” competition winner Mongraal grabbed headlines and a major bag when he accepted a staggering Ξ1,000 bid for his top Sewer Pass key NFT!

📰 General news

• ENS is on the verge of rolling out Name Wrapper support. 

• Zora saw a massive mint spike (+400k) from the Base, Introduced NFT drop by Coinbase. 

🏆 Digital collectibles

• Ordinal Inscription #1 has been listed for sale for 100 BTC.

🎨 Cryptoart & music

• fxhash, a popular Tezos-based generative art platform, added support for ETH payments. 

• Sound rolled out an optimized navigation panel. 

🎮 Decentralized gaming

• Axie Infinity updated its ELO and challenger decay systems.

• Gods Unchained released an Open All Packs feature.

• HyperPlay, a web3-native game launcher, kicked off its early access launch.

• Parallel’s $PRIME token is now transferable, and Parallel Terminals are nigh.

🌐 Virtual worlds

• Decentraland is getting ready for Metaverse Fashion Week.

• ilemi spotted “Metaverse Landlords,” i.e. 181 addresses that have collected 100 plots of land across Decentraland, Otherside, The Sandbox, and Voxels.

🪙 NFTfi

• Uniswap introduced a mobile wallet via Apple TestFlight.

• rektguy NFTs are currently the highest-volume collection on NFTfi, a peer-to-peer lending marketplace.

🎆 Mint spotlight: Crowd

By the creators of the Creature World collection, the new generative Crowd series is the first open-edition mint to be launched via OpenSea. Dropped on Thursday and since closed, the series racked up over 38,000 mints at over Ξ0.029 a pop over the course of 24 hours. With over Ξ1,110 in primary sales and over Ξ250 in secondary sales so far, Crowd just ushered in OE season for OpenSea in a big way!

Creature World @creatureworld

CREATURE WORLD PRESENTS: CROWD A GENERATIVE OPEN EDITION

11:51 PM ∙ Feb 28, 2023

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🔭 Mint watch:

• Bankless Monday Mint — The latest Podcast NFT from Bankless Collectibles, “Is the CIA Spying on Crypto” featuring author and journalist Annie Jacobsen, dropped this week; at the time of writing 21 out of 100 editions were still available to mint at Ξ0.07 each (There’s also a 24h free Gauntlet Mint for Genesis Collectors ongoing today!)

Bankless @BanklessHQ

Crypto is a non-state actor To some, this could mean crypto is an adversarial movement to the government Enough that they might be spying on us🕵️ An epic episode with @AnnieJacobsen Listen & collect at 3pm EST collectibles.bankless.com

5:29 PM ∙ Feb 27, 2023

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🙇 3 insightful threads weekly to level up your NFT knowledge!

1. soup on why Gem shouldn’t be slept on:

soup {Øx} 🍭 @0xsoupnft

With the recent marketplace war of @blur_io vs. @opensea, it seems many aren’t giving enough attention to @gemxyz. Why you should be paying attention to @gemxyz? // A Thread 🧵👇 // [1/17]

11:30 PM ∙ Feb 28, 2023

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2. Signal on recent big changes in the Moonbirds ecosystem:

Signal @_thesignal

TLDR on @moonbirds 1hr parliament🧵 🔚 Highrise scrapped. 🎨Art is the heart, mission, & vision. 💲Token delayed until better regulatory clarity. 🤫Proof unifies into codename “MB Elders” Jan 2025. 💎Diamond nest Apr 18th. 🥚Mythics, Apr 17th. 🖌️Lots coming up Mar/April

9:43 PM ∙ Mar 2, 2023

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3. Upshot on its upcoming arrival in the NFT lending scene:

Upshot @UpshotHQ

Upshot Update 🔮 We will be entering the NFT Lending Space 🚀 Leveraging our appraisal models and new lending infrastructure, we will be launching NFT lending strategies. Let’s dive into how what goes into these strategies and how we’re bringing them to market.

7:31 PM ∙ Mar 1, 2023

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✨ My NFT tool of the week: Mint.fun Customizing

Mint.fun is becoming the preferred minting frontend for many emerging NFT projects, and it just introduced an awesome new feature that allows creators to customize the layout and aesthetics of their collection’s mint page. To access this resource, simply click the “Customize” button on the projects you have created while on the site.

mint.fun @mintdotfun

🔔 alert for all creators: 🔔 🚨 mint.fun now lets you customize your project! 🚨 you can now customize the: • layout options (this is huge!) • button design • description • images on your page

11:55 PM ∙ Mar 1, 2023

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💥 In NFTs, context is everything…

This week, the wizard-themed Noun 627 auctioned for Ξ42.84, while the average clearing price of the previous 10 Noun auctions was Ξ26. This major spike is clearly the result of Nouns DAO’s recent release of “The Wizard’s Hat,” an animated short and the decentralized brand collective’s second OE drop. The wizard-themed short has made the wizard-themed Noun that much more iconic, indicating the significance of context in the valuation of NFTs!

4156 @punk4156

wizard hat noun selling for a large premium after release of the wizard’s hat film / edition feels like a small validation of the brand building thesis

1:46 PM ∙ Mar 1, 2023

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😜 And another one… and another one…

We’ve all had bets that go to zero. Keep your chin up, though, because you automatically miss all the shots that you don’t take!

Rooshy.eth @ILikeNFTs

Gm

5:42 PM ∙ Mar 1, 2023

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Action steps

• 🆕 Read What’s New with ZKs? in Bankless

• 🌱 Watch RegenPunk with Gregory Landua on Green Pill 

• 🙇 Catch up on my other write-ups from this week: 

  • ✧ MetaMask x Unity

  • ✧ 5 Promising NFTfi Opps

  • ✧ Surviving Lower NFT Royalties

Author Bio

William M. Peaster is a professional writer and creator of Metaversal—a Bankless newsletter focused on the emergence of NFTs in the cryptoeconomy. He’s also recently been contributing content to Bankless, JPG, and beyond!

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Not financial or tax advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. This newsletter is not tax advice. Talk to your accountant. Do your own research.

Disclosure. From time-to-time I may add links in this newsletter to products I use. I may receive commission if you make a purchase through one of these links. Additionally, the Bankless writers hold crypto assets. See our investment disclosures here.