NFTs In A Nutshell: A Weekly Review

Massive money moved in NFTs this week. We saw a number of different stories break throughout the week highlighting some big money being spent in the space. Of course, we got our usual dose of new partnerships and eye-catching NFT news, too.

As always, we crack open the NFT nutshell every Saturday to give you a bite-sized recap of everything that’s happened in the past seven days. Let’s get into it:

This Week’s Non-Fungible Token News

Disney Furthers Investment In NFTs With VeVe Partnership

VeVe is a marketplace for NFTs with a particular focus on legacy IP. In it’s early days, VeVe has most notably been executing NFT drops with Disney IP, such as Marvel.

This week, Disney looks to be doubling down on it’s partnership with VeVe. Disney+ Day is just a couple weeks away, and Disney will be expanding it’s IP offering with VeVe’s NFTs. Expect some characters from Star Wars and Pixar (Toy Story, Cars, etc.) in the lead-up to Disney+ Day.

The move suggests a continued bullish perspective from Disney on NFTs. Don’t be surprised if more legacy IP comes to the blockchain as we look towards next year.

A Record-Breaking Ape Sale

Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs have been generating interest from buyers now willing to spend into the millions of dollars. An unbelievable rise from an especially unique community over the past year or so.

Sotheby’s ‘Natively Digital 1.2: The Collectors’ auction brought in a record-breaking $3.4M for Bored Ape #8817 this past week. The auction was the first on Sotheby’s newly launched Metaverse art platform. Less than 1% of Apes have gold fur, which #8817 has.

#AuctionUpdate #BAYC #8817 sells for a RECORD $3,408,000 USD! This is the first time it has been made available since it was minted. Less than 1% of all Bored Apes have the gold fur trait. From the collection of @j1mmyeth #NativelyDigital pic.twitter.com/HfFTpEOIUh

— Sotheby's Metaverse (@Sothebysverse) October 26, 2021

A Nearly $3M Nissan GT-R NFT? 

Reports emerged this week of a $2.8M bid on a Nissan GT-R NFT that came with a set of keys. The NFTs reserve price was around $220,000 in an auction led by Nissan Canada. However, according to driving.ca, the NFT marketplace conducting the bid, RubiX Network, was unable to validate the transaction. Instead, the NFT sold for it’s reserve price.

Facebook, err… Meta Teases NFT Support

Meta, formerly known as Facebook, unveiled a series of new projects in tandem with the company’s rebrand this past week. As part of Facebook Reality Labs Keynote, NFTs and virtual goods are seemingly involved – though in what capacity is yet to be determined.

The Misleading CryptoPunk

A first glance can be deceiving. If you moved too quickly, you might’ve mistaken this week’s eye-popping CryptoPunk sale that went for over $500M as a record-breaking CryptoPunk sale.

The beauty of the blockchain is oftentimes it’s scope of transparency. Enough to represent the ultimate public ledger, but not so much to necessarily expose identity.

Within a matter of hours of the notable transaction of Punk #9998, NFT community members were able to determine that it was the same individual on both ends of the trade, executing a flash loan – likely to grab some attention. If that was indeed the motivation, it’s safe to say that it worked.

Related Reading | As NFT Games Emerge, Meet Crypto Fight Club

Tezos is one of a number of blockchains that will be supported on Adobe's Behance product. Tezos has increasingly had it's name mentioned around NFTs lately. | Source: XTZ-USD on TradingView.com

Adobe’s Behance Onboarding NFTs

Behance, Adobe’s largest creative network and social media platform, announced this week NFT integration for creators using a variety of blockchains. Tezos (XTZ) as well as Polygon (MATIC), Solana (SOL), and Flow (FLOW) are being integrated onto the platform.

Additionally, Behance will be partnering with marketplaces like OpenSea and Rarible to ensure that metadata is protected to ensure creative authenticity. Adobe is also reportedly integrating NFT verification into it’s PhotoShop product.

‘The Economist’ Goes Down The Rabbit Hole of NFTs

Time Magazine has been one of the more notable legacy publications exploring NFTs, along with traditional media companies like CNN and Playboy. This past week, The Economist joined the ranks too this week.

The publication raised 99.9 ETH, or around $420,000 for charity.

GameStop Firmly Entrenched With NFTs

Looking for a career change? It looks like GameStop is full-steam ahead on NFTs. The company has been especially crypto-engaged this year, and now has several job listings open on it’s job board centered on NFT development.

McRib NFTs?

A bit of buzz on Twitter (and elsewhere) in recent days surrounds McDonald’s recent announcement of… McRib NFTs. That’s right, after 40 years of McRib, McDonald’s is celebrating with a limited-edition NFT release. NFTs will be released via sweepstakes. The move comes just a couple weeks after the company’s division in China released an NFT in tandem with a new headquarters building.

NFT NYC

If you’re New York City-based, you’ve likely heard about it by now – or seen it on local billboards. NFT NYC is here this coming week. The first-ever NFT get-together is here with it’s third installment, bringing a massive amount of events and networking opportunities to the city next week.

Related Reading | The Andy Milonakis NFT Show, Ep. 10 – Deep Reflections And Island Boys

Featured image from Pixabay, Charts from TradingView.com