The Big Read: After the hype and crash, can NFTs get a new lease of life?

SINGAPORE: Within just two years, the world had seen the value and trading volume of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) rising rapidly, before tumbling almost just as quickly.

Among the notable developments at the early stages of the bull run was when Christie’s auction house in March 2021 sold an NFT of a digital collage by artist Beeple for US$69.3 million (S$92.9 million) worth of cryptocurrency - the highest price for an NFT at that time - to a Singapore-based investor.

Barely months later in September, a team of Singaporeans which included then third-year Nanyang Technological University (NTU) student Marc Yap, made headlines for selling all 3,876 units of their NFT digital trading cards, dubbed the Dark Zodiac collection, in an hour.

While these digital cards fetched a lower price of about S$1.4 million in cryptocurrency, which was split among the project partners, it still surprised Mr Yap, who was experimenting with NFTs for his first time. 

“I really didn’t expect such a good outcome … I thought it had about 40 to 50 per cent chance of succeeding,” said Mr Yap, who was the design director for the project.

Amid the craze, companies such as Nike, Coca Cola, McDonald's also hopped onto the bandwagon, in a bid to find new ways to attract younger consumers. 

But the bubble burst within months.

Mr Yap, now 29, told TODAY that his involvement in NFTs soon after Dark Zodiac was not as fruitful and resulted in “a couple of thousands (of dollars) in losses”, somewhat reflective of the market’s change in fortune.

Trading volume for NFTs plunged to US$11.8 billion in 2023, down from US$26.3 billion the year before, according to an industry report by independent cryptocurrency data aggregator CoinGecko.

Another report by crypto news