NFTs Go Down, NFTs Go Up

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Here's what happening:

• Ambiguous Signals From The NFT Market
• Anonymous Targets The BAYC
• SWIFT Teams Up With Chainlink
• UAE Establishes HQ in the Metaverse
• A Costly Bot's Mistake
• Selected Meme of The Day

Ambiguous NFT Market Signals

Yesterday NFT holders had no choice but to observe some painful facts. "NFT Trading Volumes Fell 97% From 2022 January Highs," headlines stated.

Critics rejoiced: "It's here to stay ... it's inevitable ... it's future ... there must be something here. And yet the whole farce now lies in ruin, exactly as predicted," prominent skeptical voices tweeted. And they had a point - a 97% drop is truly a telling number.

Yet, others don't jump to turn the funeral mood on. Quite obviously, the market is in shambles, and the pound is falling, the energy crisis is about to kick the world in its ribs, the inflation rates are expected to increase again and again. We're far from being able to say that, OK, the worst is behind us. Therefore more volatile and innovative forms of assets suffer the most. Yet that doesn't mean that web3 has decided NOT to arrive anymore. The future is coming, one day at a time.

And there are other signals that show how (at least certain) NFTs are still alive and kicking.

CryptoPunks NFT 2924 has just been sold for 3,300 ETH. That's almost $4,5M. And it's with ETH's price swimming in its post-merge lows. It was sold by "seedphrase", an NFT collector whose collection you can check out right here.

Yeah, of course, there are sellers. But we're talking about a deal worth 3,300 ETH. This means that there are buyers as well. And they are very well aware of the NFT trading volumes being down 97%. This means they sense something. Or are they just ridiculously miscalculating? But there are more optimists.

Christie's Auction House, a colossal name in the art world, the one which casually deals with selling Picasso or Da Vinci pieces, has just announced that they're launching an On-Chain NFT art platform. Yeah, while the skeptics are already playing Chopin's Funeral March for the NFT 'bubble', names like Christie's are just getting started.

"The first ever global auction house to host fully on-chain sales: introducing Christie's 3.0," Christie's tweeted. "Christie's 3.0 allows for auctions to be carried out on the Ethereum blockchain network from start to finish," the tweet elaborates.

The platform was created in partnership with blockchain analysis firm Chainalysis, Manifold, the NFT minting platform, and Spatial - a metaverse builder. So big names got together for a great cause. It looks like NFTs are here to say, they're just waiting for their phoenix moment. While others continue having problems.

Bored Ape Yacht Controversies

It's been over 3 months since Youtuber Philion uploaded the scandalous video in which he accused the Bored Ape Yacht Club, the famous NFT collection and people behind it, of participating in a massive-scale troll fest which got the world accepting and sharing imagery with subliminal racist and occult messages in it.

After the video caused waves, Yuga Labs, the company behind BAYC, responded by denying all of these claims. "We've become the target of a crazy disinformation campaign accusing us — a group of Jewish, Turkish, Pakistani, and Cuban friends — of being super-secret Nazis," they summed the whole ordeal up.

This time it's Anonymous, the internet hacktivist group that decided to point the barrel of a gun to BAYC's chest. They posted a video in which they listed pretty much the same accusations made by Philion earlier.

In addition to that, they suggested that holders of these NFTs, including high-profile celebs such as Neymar Junior, Kevin Hart, Shaquille O'Neal, and others, are being exploited as vessels unknowingly carrying this package of everything evil. Anonymous urges these big names to take a clear stance on whether they're OK with being on board with someone who can be associated with such not excellent associations.

SWIFT Shakes Hands With Chainlink

SWIFT, the system that holds the traditional banking system together by allowing them to securely communicate with each other, has just announced cooperation with crypto data provider Chainlink. The reason? Initiative to develop a cross-chain crypto transfer project.

It would connect SWIFT's network to almost every legit blockchain and allow users to access crypto and traditional assets on one single network. OK, that's big. Why is this happening?

On September 28, Sergey Nazarov, the Chainlink co-founder, together with SWIFT strategy director Jonathan Ehrenfeld Solé announced this project at SmartCon 2022 Conference in NY. During it, the latter stated that there's "undeniable interest from institutional investors into digital assets."

The SWIFT system connects over 11,000 banks globally. That's a lot of potential crypto newcomers. Things are heading in a clear direction.

UAE Ministry of Economy Enters Metaverse

Well, not simply 'enters'. They literally just opened up new headquarters in the Metaverse. They announced it in a quite classy manner - by sharing their 'third address'. (spoiler alert - it's in the Metaverse)

According to the announcement and presentation, visitors will be able to obtain a ticket, which will serve as an invitation for a 'customer happiness center employee' to interact with the 'tourist'. These HQ contain a huge auditorium that could be used as a place for virtual conferences and meetings to take place.

We'll be hearing more similar stuff coming out of the UAE. This summer, on July 18, the UAE announced their 'Metaverse strategy'. According to it, they aim to create 40,000 virtual jobs by 2030. Well, we do live in interesting times.

A Costly Bot's Mistake

So, it was announced that an MEV (Maximal Extractable Value) bot, a supposedly convenient tool of passive income that functions as an automated Ethereum arbitrage trading tool, has just failed successfully.

The story went like this: Someone made a huge transfer to Uniswap of $1.8M. The DEX was not prepared for such a humongous amount because it lacked liquidity. So this MEV bot guy stepped in, seized an arbitrage opportunity and made 800 ETH (around $1M) in profits. This is the good part. The sad part is that… one hour later a hacker tricked our MEV bot fellow into authorizing a malicious transaction. And drained all of the gains PLUS 300 extra ETH (around $1.4M).

So, summa summarum, someone made a $1M profit and ended up with a $500K loss an hour later. Just another day in the DeFi world…

Selected Meme of The Day