Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT Floor Prices Rise Above CryptoPunks
The floor price of bored ape NFTs has flipped CryptoPunks for the first time. There seems to be many reasons behind it.
The floor price of Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) NFTs has risen above that of Larva Labs’ CryptoPunks for the first time. The floor price means the lowest price at which a type of NFT is currently available for sale.
The current floor price of a BAYC NFT is 53.9 ETH ($215,350), whereas the floor price of a CryptoPunk NFT is 52.69 ETH ($210,515).
Why this matters?
This is important because BAYC NFTs are much newer to the market than CryptoPunks — seen as the one of the first NFTs. The former NFTs were launched in April 2021 and the latter in 2017.
BAYC NFTs and CryptoPunks are a collection of 10,000 unique digital collectibles on the Ethereum blockchain. CryptoPunks were created by two Canadian software developers Matt Hall and John Watkinson whereas BAYC NFTs were created by a team of four pseudonymous developers: Gargamel, Gordon Goner, Emperor Tomato Ketchup, and No Sass.
The rarer an NFT, the higher price it generally fetches. For instance, BAYC #8817, the third-rarest gold fur ape, was sold for a record $3.4 million at a Sotheby’s auction at the time.
From the CryptoPunks collection, CryptoPunk #7523, one of 9 Alien punks, was sold for a record $11.8 million at the auction house Sotheby’s. On Larva Labs’ native marketplace, the highest sale price to date has been for CryptoPunk #4156 for $10.26 million.
What lead to the flip?
Over the last few months, the floor price of CryptoPunks has fallen steadily, whereas that of BAYC NFTs has increased. There appear to be multiple factors at play.
“BAYC NFTs have generous IP rights compared to CryptoPunks,” Bobby Ong, co-founder of CoinGecko and an NFT expert, told The Block. “Some people are not happy that Larva Labs is not assigning more rights.”
Put simply, CyptoPunk NFT owners do not get rights to use their NFTs for any commercial purpose, whereas BAYC NFT owners get IP rights. Bored Ape owners are using these IP rights to build a blockchain-based game in partnership with Animoca Brands.
The BAYC team is also expected to release its native token next year, which also appears to be a driving factor for apes’ higher floor price, said Ong.
Larva Labs has also been less active in promoting CryptoPunks, though it did launch a new collection called Meebits, banking the equivalent of $80 million on the launch day. Over the summer, the design studio also signed a Hollywood Deal over the summer that could see its NFTs appear on the big screen. In recent weeks, however, it’s faced criticism from collectors over the strict copyright rules associated with Punks, which forbid owners from using their NFTs for commercial purposes.
While CryptoPunks NFTs have also attracted the interest of the likes of Christie’s and Jay-Z this year, they’ve arguably been overshadowed by Bored Ape Yacht Club’s meteoric rise. Several celebrities including Jimmy Fallon, Stephen Curry, and DJ Khaled have all bought their own apes in recent months. “Permission to come a bored?” tweeted Fallon, announcing his purchase in November.
