Will Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs Survive the Price Drop?

After the FTX liquidity crunch crypto prices are down, which is affecting the NFT market. “Blue chip” BAYC NFTs are seeing sinking prices as ETH falls and owners potentially panic-sell their assets.

Alex Harutunian

Nov 20, 2022 - 2 min read

Prices for Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs are falling amid the latest crypto market downturn connected to FTX collapse. The cheapest BAYC NFT is listed at 58.2 ETH as of writing this article , or about $70,000, which is more than 80% less (in USD) than at its peak price in April. Back in spring the floor price of a Bored Ape was $429,000 or 152 ETH.

Bored Ape NFTs have lost their leading position to CryptoPunks, that are now also owned by Yuga Labs. The floor price of a CryptoPunks NFT is around $80,000 or 66,5 ETH at the time of writing. This makes CryptoPunks more stable assets that better hold their value amid crisis.

There is an interesting factor that may be pushing BAYC prices down. It is the crypto market despair after the FTX collapse, which may be pushing investors to sell their “blue chip” NFT assets. And there is actually an on-chain proof for this.

WETH trades as a percentage of total OpenSea volume is above 50% for the first time today. The chart below is pretty wild.

Everyone accepting the bids that are out there.

This is up from 40% when I tweeted this chart earlier. pic.twitter.com/5Zo66UPLfF
— NFTstatistics.eth (@punk9059) November 9, 2022

On OpenSea users started trading more with Wrapped Ethereum (WETH) instead of standard ETH. Bidding on OpenSea requires WETH, so when that number rises, it means more NFT owners are accepting bids placed on their assets. And these bids are typically below market value, so overall this increase signifies that people are offloading their assets.

On the other hand, this NFT range has become a "decentralised brand" where holders of each NFT also has the intellectual property rights for the name and the ape face and can create anything they wish, like a bar, a fashion collection, or even a cartoon. For instance, two BAYC holders opened a pop-up bar in London called Arcade Apes where they hold networking events and public talks for crypto entrepreneurs with related tokens.

The BAYC NFT prices have hit another low, but are they going to recover? Well, the market will decide for the most part, but there is also another factor that has a strong influence in the crypto world – community. BAYC NFTs are not only valuable assets but also a key to entering a community of bright and enthusiastic people from around the globe. And the barrier for entry is lower now as prices fall, which may motivate more members to join and increase the demand for BAYC NFTs. We continue to observe.