It’s been a wild year for NFTsand aAlong the way, there have been some spectacular losses, mistakes and questionable choices made by people in the room.
We’ve collected them here for you: the most notable Ls which NFT collectors, creators and marketplaces took over during 2022.
These are not necessarily the biggest losses in terms of dollar amount, and they are not ranked. But they all stood out to us at Decrypt during our reporting this year.
Some of them are just bafflingly wrong, and in the best cases, the people involved took the L, owned it, sorted it out, and moved on. Many of these cases can be a lesson for collectors in 2023 to make wiser choices – and avoid self-inflicted wounds.
An ENS old man has gone wrong
Pseudonym collector Franklin is known for its massive Bored Ape Yacht Club collection – currently 60+ NFTs, but it changes regularly – not to mention his constant flipping to extract large and small profits on trades. But he also tends to air out his Ls, as he did with a mistake around one Ethereum naming service (ENS) name last summer.
In July, Franklin made a “joke” offer of 100 ETH (roughly $150,000 at the time) on a long-form ENS domain that he owned through an alternative wallet, only to create some Twitter buzz and have a laugh.
But then he sold stop making-fake-bids-it’s-honestly-lame-my-guy.eth ONE domain without canceled the offer from his other wallet and the new buyer accepted the pending offer of 100 ETH and collected the profit.
“This will be the joke of the century,” he tweeted. “I deserve all the jokes and criticism.”
Logan Paul shares his L
YouTube star Logan Paul didn’t mind sharing his biggest L from 2021’s speculative bubble while trying to make something better out of it. In August 2021, Paul spent $623,000 on an NFT from 0N1 Force, a profile picture (PFP) project that started when the market reached new highs. A year later the hype is gone and 0N1 Force NFTs are starting at around $460 worth of ETH.
In July, Paul tweeted that the NFT was “essentially worth nothing”, and said he wanted to “immortalize my mistake” by taking a photo of himself in a replica costume and selling it as an NFT in his Original project. It sold for just under $20,000 in ETH.
Emergency rooms are locked up
Here’s a very painful reminder of why you can’t be too careful with coding smart contractswhich holds the code that powers NFT projects and autonomous decentralized apps. In April 2022, artist and former MLB player Micah Johnson launched his Akutars project, taking in tens of millions of dollars in ETH during the mintage. And then it got sour.
Soon after launch, exploits were discovered and triggered by unknown attackers, permanently lock the contract with all funds inside it. About $34 million worth of ETH (at the time) is now forever locked in the smart contract, inaccessible to its creators or NFT buyers. Johnson promised to persevere, relaunch with a new contract and refund buyers who were owed money.
Bored Ape retails for $115
Earlier this year, it was common to see Bored Ape NFTs selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars in ETH—so when one sold for just $115, it was a total shock. This isn’t the first or last time we’ve seen a blue chip NFT sell for a fraction of what it’s worth, but this was one of the more prominent examples from this year.
It’s still unclear exactly what happened, but the seller accepted an offer of 115 DAI, a dollar-pegged stablecoin. Some theorize that the seller took it for a bid of 115 ETH, which would have been the correct value (Apes started at 106.8 ETH, or $358,000 at the time). Others believe it was deliberate tax collection, perhaps designed to see as a mistake. ONE Mutant Monkey were sold together for $25 worth of DAI, which only compounded the (potential) losses.
FTX NFTs are stuck
For some, FTXs into the NFT room at the end of 2021 felt like another legitimizing moment for the nascent market. A year later, amid the cryptocurrency exchange’s very public collapse and criminal charges against founder Sam Bankman-Fried, it has become another example of what not to do with NFT marketplace infrastructure.
FTX put major brands into the NFT space, including concert festivals Coachella and Tomorrowland and the Formula 1 team Mercedes-AMG Petronasbut now many of these tagged assets are stuck on the market during bankruptcy proceedings. Other NFTs that users withdrew into self-deposit wallets no longer work properly, as the images are stored on FTX servers. That’s another red flag for marketplaces that take or retain custody of users’ NFTs.
Pixelmon’s reveal
At the height of the NFT frenzy earlier this year, almost anything with a bit of buzz around it could sell out and generate huge sums of cash in the process. An unfortunate example is Pixelmon, a clear Pokemon rash with NFTs that clearly didn’t have much behind it.
After raising $70 million by selling monster NFTs, the artwork of these creatures was revealed—and it was terrible. Even the founder called the disclosure a “terrible mistake”. A new team acquired the rights, launched more refined works of art, and builds a game around the NFTs. But they are now trading for a fraction of the original coin price.
Coinbase is rethinking Bored Ape movies
At the height of the Bored Ape frenzy in April, Coinbase announced plans to make a trilogy of short films based on the NFTs, even with monkeys owned by community members. But when the first short was released in July in a much weaker market, it was widely panned by viewers, who criticized the lack of monkeys and awkward timing significant Coinbase layoffs.
After that, it was radio silence until Coinbase confirmed it Decrypt in December that it chose to “stop production” on the remaining chapters. The firm’s statement left the window open for an eventual revival, but given the state of the NFT and crypto markets, we’d be surprised. Echo Recent Comments from noted NFT artist Emily “pplpleaser” Yang, there’s a lot of money for Web3 video content, but not much good yet.
Aurory’s FTX NFTs hit differently
When FTX teamed up with Solana NFT game Aurory and esports giant Team SoloMid (TSM) to launch limited edition NFTs in October 2021, the collaboration made a big splash, with one of the auctioned NFTs even benefiting charity. But after the stock market crash, the huge amounts paid for some of the NFTs sure feels a lot different now.
In November pseudonymous NFT collector Bardstocks tweeted, “$380K down the drain” while sharing photos of two of the Aurory PFPs with FTX clothing. “I was so excited to get these,” they added, lamenting the company’s implosion. They are technically limited NFTs, but the FTX name doesn’t quite make the same impression today.
$143,000 for gaming fan art
Pseudonymous NFT investor Pranksy has done very well in the NFT market, and has made major efforts that have yielded results in the past. But he’s also made some head-scratching moves along the way – like paying $143,000 worth of ETH for a limited 1-of-1 Killer GF NFT back in January.
It’s a lightly animated piece of fan art of heroine Samus Aran from Nintendo’s Metroid video game series, albeit tokenized as an Ethereum NFT and sold for a staggering sum. Pranksy blamed on “the market and personal madness” for the purchase and NFT has a peak offer on OpenSea of around $215 worth of ETH right now. Killer GF NFTs mostly start at just $165 now.
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