Non-Foldable Tokens (NFTs) have become a fast-spreading phenomenon since their introduction in early 2021. These digital assets, anything from art and music to tacos and chimpanzee faces, are sold like alien paintings from the 17th century. The madness has become so wild that even people outside the crypto and blockchain field have flocked to their closest search engines to understand How to buy NFT. The result is the oscillating trend shown in the image below.
The so-called mania NFT
Thus, the NFT market is on fire. Legendary basketball player LeBron James has sold his video of him dunking as a digital asset for $200,000. Grimes, the other significant figure of Elon Musk, sold her digital art for over $6 million in just one day.
And remember the popular neon cat meme? Yes, it was sold as NFT for $590,000. The hugely popular Disaster Girl meme sold for $500,000 by the woman in whom she appeared as a young girl.
But one of the most interesting things about NFTs is that none of these assets has anything tangible to do with it. It’s just a JPEG, PNG, or some other digital format on your screen. For example, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey sold his first tweet for $2.9 million. That’s the power of collectibles—it might not make sense to everyday Joes, but enthusiasts are willing to pay millions for their exclusivity.
NFTs seem like pure hype to some. Boomers compare it to the infamous tulip craze. Jenks calls them beanie kids. Meanwhile, millennials believe this is a repeat of the ICO crash of 2017.
But is there more to NFTs than meets the eye? It could be a new model or a completely new investment class. This is what CoinStats wants to discover. By the end of this article, we will be one step away from the truth and understand whether it is worth knowing about it How to buy NFT tokens.
Let’s start with the basics.
What is NFT
People use popular blockchain tokens to issue their own tokens. For example, they use coins like Ethereum’s ETH, Cardano’s ADA, Polkadot’s DOT, and many other cryptocurrencies to put them into a smart contract. Then they issue their digital assets from the smart contract, which they will call something unique and special, like CoinStats, etc.
So, in the end, the issuer still takes its valuation from ETH, ADA, DOT, etc. Later, people attach artwork and similar perks to their tokens and put them on the market for trading. As a result, interested collectors can purchase the digital assets as they are backed by cryptocurrencies with enough liquid to be converted back into USD, EUR, etc.
This is a simple way to explain how NFTs work. But the reason these icons have value is the same as any other work of art: because they are rare, and people want to own them.
Counterfeiting risks
But one must ask, can’t the creators of NFT create more of the same artwork because it’s digital? Well, no, the creator will not be able to step in and replicate the same artwork for the same reason that Bitcoin has a maximum supply of 21 million tokens; Nobody can step in and create more of the same NFT because it’s on the blockchain.
And if the creator releases the same NFT again, he risks making it less rare, which tends to reduce its value in the long run. However, there will always be a slight difference that separates a duplicate NFT from the original, whether that’s the ticker icon or the launch date. Its uniqueness can be demonstrated and verified by looking at the blockchain, even though the artworks can appear to be 100% identical.
This may sound silly, but digital collectors care about these kinds of little things. For example, the digital version of a Pokemon card called Charizard with the FIRST EDITION stamp was released in 1999. It now sells for hundreds of thousands of dollars, and although there is an identical copy of the card, it sells for a much lower price.
This is why NFTs are valuable. One can create similar artwork with 99% attributes of the original, but it will not be exactly the same. NFTs are valuable because creators attach special physical assets or experience to them or sell them at special events.
Is it worth knowing how to buy NFT tokens?
Before people decide to find out how or Where to buy NFTsThey should ask themselves whether it is worth putting hundreds and millions of dollars into digital holdings. For example, does buying an NFT token make the creators wealthy and does not bring any value to the buyer? Let’s understand.
The most important thing to understand is that it depends on what people buy. We have created a list of criteria that we hope will help its users understand which NFTs are valuable and which are not.
The first criterion: popularity
Funny but disturbingly true. A reputable NFT creator must be a famous person/thing with a strong brand. The larger the originator, the safer it is to invest in NFT.
For example, if you buy an NFT related to, say, Harry Potter, it will always have some long-term value in the eyes of billions of Potterheads around the world.
The second criterion: the first factor
The “first” factor means an NFT being first by some famous creator or by the industry it represents. Basically, CryptoKitties became very valuable because it was one of the first NFTs ever created.
From the looks of it, CryptoKitties will always have a lot of value attached to it. It’s the same reason the Pokemon Card sells for hundreds of thousands of dollars – because these artworks are the first of their kind.
The “first” factor always creates some degree of hype and excitement around it. And if you can get into that hype, you can start treating your NFTs as an investment asset that you can sell to someone else later.
The third criterion: tenacity
Having an NFT tied to a real, tangible physical asset increases the odds of it becoming an investment. For example, the Pokemon NFT that one can use to claim ownership of a physical deliverable Pokemon card adds an extra layer of oomph to the digital collectible industry.
Sometimes buying an NFT that has an experience attached to it—the chance to meet or collaborate with the creator, for example—adds great value to it. Digital rights, for example, are tangible assets that can be attached to NFTs.
Fourth/last criterion: rarity
Obviously, collectibles must be rare enough to be valuable in the first place. If not, then there is no point in buying it because everyone owns it, like, say, the Bluray version of the first Jurassic Park movie. But getting a great Steven Spielberg movie on VHS tape is pretty rare (please contact the author if you have one).
Now the above four criteria are not points on How to buy NFTs. They are only the brainchild of the author who collects dinosaur games. But still, they can help the NFT maniacs decide which piece of digital art is worth their hard-earned money.
Where to buy NFT: a curated list
There are many options when it comes to purchasing NFTs. Like any other product, NFTs also have specific markets, where artists put them up for sale and collectors can buy them.
CoinStats has put together a handy list:
open sea
OpenSea has emerged as one of the most popular NFT marketplaces out there. Founded in 2017 by Devin Finzer and the software development team of Alex Atallah, the portal recently achieved a record weekly sales of $1 billion, and the total value provided for its smart contract was more than 450,000 Ethereum, or about $1.4 billion.
Yahoo Finance reports that “throughout the entire month of August, the platform generated $2.93 billion in trading volume, driven by more than 2 million transactions from nearly 190,000 users.”
The OpenSea Marketplace features a filterable price and sales status, featuring everything from virtual real estate and digital pets to audio episodes from The Weeknd. It also has a dedicated statistics tab – almost like a stock ticker – that ranks sellers by volume, average selling price, and number of assets sold.
Buyers need to load their wallets with Ether (ETH), USD Coin (USDC) or Dai (DAI) and more than 150 other crypto tokens. Then they can buy NFTs directly from sellers or bid on NFTs at auctions.
Location: New York, New York
Categories: digital art, music, games, domain names, virtual worlds, sports, collectibles.
Mentable
Many call the Mintable the eBay of NFTs. The market was supported by Time Ventures, owned by Marc Benioff and billionaire investor Mark Cuban.
The Ethereum and Zilliqa blockchains support the Mintable Market, with internal MetaMask integration allowing buyers to create crypto wallets. Content creators can create free “no-gas” NFT items, short-run printable strings, or traditional transaction-based items.
On the other hand, buyers can purchase NFT items listed or bid on auctions.
Location: Singapore
Categories: digital art, photography, video, games, templates, domain names.
NBA Top Shot
DapperLabs launched the NBA Top Shot, an NBA licensed game that enables fans to collect and trade digital “moments” from their basketball games, in early 2020. Limited edition kits can be sold for between $9 and $230 in the open market.
These moments feature video highlights, player stats, and box scores. After purchasing it, fans can view their curated groups and follow their favorite teams. The NBA Top Shot also enables users to trade secured assets on their block chains.
Location: Vancouver, Canada
category: sports collectibles
Axi Infinity
Vietnamese startup Sky Mavis has launched Axie Infinity, a Pokemon-inspired video game that allows players to collect, breed, and trade digital pets and build farming kingdoms. Launched in 2020, it has become one of the fastest growing markets, single-handedly outperforming blockchains such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.
The number of daily active users of Axie Infinity increased from 30,000 in April to more than 1 million in August. The Ethereum-based project is registered Over $30 million in Ether transfers every day over the past month. The popularity reached such an extent that the Philippine Department of Finance and the Office of Internal Revenue had to remind players that their income from Axie Infinity is subject to income tax.
Axie encodes characters and plots as NFTs. Collectors and players can then purchase them via the online marketplace. This is where you will see pets selling hundreds of dollars and virtual plots earning more than 20 thousand dollars.
Location: Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
category: Video Games
Enterprise
Launched in February 2021, the institution is known for hosting NFT sales of viral internet meme Nyan Cat and Pak’s Finite Records. It also enabled Pussy Riot’s NadyaTolokonnikova, Edward Snowden and the Aphex Twins to sell their work via auction.
The organization arranges the creators’ work into a grid of cards and lists popular auctions at the top of the page along with featured artists. The marketplace lists the businesses along with their reserve prices, so buyers can submit their bids accordingly within 24 hours with a 15-minute extension.
Location: Los Angeles California
category: digital art
Other Markets to browse: Rarible, Decentraland, Zora, Nifty Gateway, Venly, Valuables, Zeptagram, GROW.HOUSE, MakersPlace, Sandbox, etc.
conclusion
That’s it guys. NFTs make perfect sense for those who are already into collectibles. Investors who do not find a digital component worth attracting capital should ignore this madness. But those who believe in the long-term valuation of rare and rare assets will greatly enjoy dipping their toes into the nascent NFT sector.