The largest NFT party in the world expresses confidence

The NFT.NYC conference last week transformed Times Square into a hotbed of cryptocurrency enthusiasm even though a crypto winter is widely acknowledged to be having a chilling effect on everything from Bitcoin (down about 60 percent for the year) to GPUs (graphics chips used for crypto mining saw a price drop of 15 percent in May).

Nevertheless, fifteen thousand artists, fans, creators, and collectors gathered to celebrate the long-term prospects of NFT tech despite the sector’s drop in the market. While prominent NFT projects like Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) and well-known crypto proponents like Snoop Dogg generated some of the week’s most buzz-worthy stories, there was also a tonne of encouraging NFT news coming from various market segments. Let’s look more closely.

• Amid the crypto bear market, NFT.NYC expressed excitement for the present “build market,” as the one-panel host called it. The conference was brimming with hope for what the CEO of the Doodles NFT project called the “incredibly bright” future of the sector, with panels discussing how artists can use NFT intelligent contracts to automatically receive royalty payments each time their work is resold and major brands like Samsung and Nickelodeon exploring metaverse marketing.
• Of course, the digital art groups behind upstarts like Goblintown and blue-chip NFTs like BAYC continued to drive the buzz. The World of Women and Madonna co-hosted a party, while BAYC held its second annual ApeFest celebration with performances by The Roots and LCD Soundsystem. Goblintown, which shot to fame this month, had a meme-worthy event with performers speaking gibberish while dressed as goblins. (Last week, trading volumes in Goblintown tripled in a single day.)
• Snoop Dogg, Pharrell, and Spike Lee were some of the event’s most well-known attendees. The market dip “weeded out… all the folks that were exploiting the possibilities” (like the event’s Snoop Dogg impersonator? ), “said Snoop, an enthusiastic NFT collector and entrepreneur with a new Bored Ape music video, and that the market will emerge stronger. Pharrell introduced his new position as a chief brand officer for the well-known Doodles line. At the same time, Do The Right Thing director Spike Lee remarked that using NFTs to finance movies “brings greater democracy to production.”
• Companies in the cryptocurrency and e-commerce industries are both strategically acquiring NFT marketplaces at the same time. The e-commerce giant acquired KnownOrigin, now ranked 12th for all-time ETH-based NFT trade volume with $7.8 million, a year after eBay initially authorized NFT sales. The business that runs Uniswap, a well-known decentralized exchange with a trading turnover of over $1 trillion, also bought NFT marketplace aggregator Genie, which enables users to trade NFTs on most markets.
• And even in a bear market, NFTs continue to draw venture funding. Following a Series B investment that raised $130 million, NFT marketplace Magic Eden was valued at $1.6 billion this month. And Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, and Mark Cuban’s investment company, 1confirmation, just disclosed the launch of a new $100 million NFT-focused fund. Nick Tomaino, the creator of 1confirmation, responded to some of the criticism leveled at NFTs by outlining the company’s move: NFTs “appear on the surface to be a speculative casino, but in reality, they offer a better business model for creators and enable customers to become owners.”

Why it’s important: While NFT, NYC generated the most attention last week in the non-fungible hemisphere of the cryptocurrency world, several hopeful developments continue to defy the most pessimistic predictions about the impending crypto winter. People holding NFTs are at an all-time high, trade volume for the leading NFT marketplace OpenSea has more than doubled since last year, and important financial institutions like Goldman Sachs and Mastercard are investigating NFT integrations. Optimism about the future of technology pervaded the event, even though much of the NFT art on display at NFT.NYC this year had lost a considerable amount of its monetary value. NFTs will disrupt most industries, according to the conference’s co-founder Jodee Rich, including identity, ticketing, brands, music, fashion, and real estate. We are still very early in the cycle. Nevertheless, a long-term trend is starting with this.