GM - this is The Snapshot, edition #110.
This is what I’ve got for you today:
This Week In NFT World - Garga returns
Sponsored Post - Lil Nouns Hit ETH Denver with 3 ETH budget
Notable Sales - Monkes, Pandas, Azuki, Penguins
Investor Focus - The $15M QR Codes
For sponsorship enquires, please DM me on Twitter.
Have a great day,
B
This Week In NFT World - Garga returns as CEO of Yuga Labs to widespread excitement
The BAYC community was delighted to learn original founder Garga rejoined as CEO this week.
"I am stepping back in as CEO of Yuga Labs. Wylie and I are grateful for all the contributions and operational rigor Daniel has brought to the company, and appreciate his thoughtfulness and mentorship over the past year. I’m reinvigorated to be taking the reins for our next chapter. Looking at what’s ahead for Yuga, we need to execute with a more cryptonative focus across the entire company."
From @CryptoGarga
My thoughts: good for them to “return to their roots” and get back to having fun on the internet - however, it looks like they are now behind others in some of their quests. More on that in a moment.
"Crypto is the only industry where you can kick out.. A 15 year executive from Google and Activision that has an MBA and JD from Harvard And replace him with.. A short bald guy with glasses named Gargamel. And everyone responds “BULLISH”
Thoughts from @piovincenzo_
Another point: absolutely wild that highly accomplished, very experienced CEOs from Web2 struggle so much in Web 3. There is something so unique to this space which makes it incredibly difficult to transition (that being buiding in public aggressively and having hundreds or thousands of people shouting at/demanding things from you each day).
Yuga announces next journey into Otherside for Feb 29th: pivot away from AAA towards UGC content
Yuga made a huge announcement about their game/metaverse, The Otherside.
"We are not making a competitive MMO that takes many years, many tens of millions of dollars, and has enormous risks. There are AAA game companies that have their thousands of employees working on these and other projects, and that red ocean isn’t one we want to swim in.
People want to connect, share, flex, and have fun as a community. So we are going deep in evolving a social platform to enable our communities to have new ways to engage with each other."
From @OthersideMeta
The key point here for me is that they said “we are not making a competitive MMO that takes many years, many tens of millions of dollars, and has enormous risks” - but I thought they did have "many years” and “many tens of million dollars” to execute on that vision.
This was not lost on X, as Charles the founder of Nifty Island - a very well received fun game which focuses on UGC content - noted:
Node Monkes send to 0.27 BTC floor price with 175 sales in the last day
"The market cap is now $137M. Quantum Cats market cap is $39M. OMB market cap is $85M. Bitcoin Frogs market cap is $82M"
Details from @BCheque1
Optimism Airdrop 4 hits with artists earning as much as $25,000
Airdrop Season continues with Optimisn’s latest set of rewards.
The cool thing about Optimism as an L2 is that everyone knows the rewards are coming because they’ve told people they will keep doing these drops periodically, then everyone forgets, and then the airdrop is often worth a good amount.
Congrats to Numo who made $25k from their airdrop for producing cool art on Optimism.
"What an Airdrop! Its 8.5 ETH or $25,000 thank you @Optimism thank you @base thank you @basepaint_xyz”
From @numo_0
Portalcoin trading at a 38x for angels and 15x for public salers OTC after confirmed Binance listing
The angel investors got in at $0.06 per coin and presalers got in at $0.15 per coin.
This coin was fudded the hardest on the timeline because of its viral marketing tactics to induce people to participate.
It seems like The most hated coins pump the hardest thesis is playing out.
Sponsored Post - Lil Nouns Hit ETH Denver with 3 ETH budget
Lil Nouns DAO has voted for a 3 ETH proposal to give Lil Nouns a big presence at ETH Denver by sponsoring Pizza DAO’s event and incorporating mobile marketing, POAP and a Lil Pizza giveaway.
What will Lils be doing?
At PizzaDAO's event on February 28 which expects 500 attendees for the main event, Lils will be be incorporating a banner and POAP station at the event entrance and having a raffle prize with physical swag.
In addition, Lils have been working with CityDAO to secure a spot on a moving truck billboard that will be timed to go from the main Eth Denver event area to the PizzaDAO event with a "follow Lil Nouns to PizzaDAO" sign with art created by Borg - pretty fun!
This is just another example of Lil Nouns DAO governance in action, backing positive contributors to the DAO.
If you are curious about contributing to a cutting-edge DAO and getting paid to bring your ideas to life: check out our website.
Notable Sales - Monkes, Pandas, Azuki, Penguins
NodeMonke, Alien - 2.125 BTC ($108,000)
Kanpai Panda, Robot - 65 ETH ($194,000)
Azuki, Gold - 50 ETH ($145,000)
Pudgy Penguin, Wizard - 26 ETH ($76,000)
Investor Focus - The $15M QR Codes
Many details for this post were sourced from this NFT Now article
In a historic moment for the NFT world, 10 Autoglyphs exchanged hands for a staggering 5,000 ETH, equivalent to $14.5 million, marking the highest on-chain NFT transaction to date.
"One of the greatest NFT trades of all time just went through. 10 Autoglyphs bought for $1,430,560 in Feb 2021. Sold for $14,500,000 today. W flip"
Context from @CirrusNFT
From a financial standpoint, this was a huge trade: initially purchased for $1,430,560 in February 2021, the sale for $15M represents a pretty rapid 10x for the initial buyer.
From an artistic/historical standpoint: Autoglyphs, conceptualized by Larva Labs' Matt Hall and John Watkinson, emerged as the inaugural on-chain generative art series on the Ethereum blockchain. Following their success with CryptoPunks, the duo introduced this set comprising 512 unique outputs.
Why did this collection command such a staggering sum, far exceeding the current floor price of 250 ETH? These were bought for 500 ETH each.
Because it is part of a specific set, of course. And only 7 other people in the world have been able to collect full sets too.
“For a collector, acquiring a set of 10 Autoglyphs is one of the most coveted and difficult-to-acquire artworks,. There are only seven other collections in the world that also have this, one of them being Larva Labs itself.”
Schmitt in NFT NOW interview
Moreover, each Autoglyph within this ensemble boasts a sub-100 series number, indicating their status as among the earliest minted pieces in the Autoglyph series.
The new collector has remained private and intends to put these in museums and institutional settings moving forward.
The fine digital art thesis is as strong as ever.
Have a great day,
B
Disclaimer: The content covered in this newsletter is not to be considered as investment advice. It is for informational and educational purposes only.
I hold some of the NFTs mentioned in these newsletters