NFT has plunged into the Ice Age; how much have the once high-profile stars lost?

Author: bayemon.eth, ChainCatcher

In a continuously declining market, users have little desire to trade NFTs, which are relatively illiquid and have limited use cases. Data analysis shows that over 80% of BAYC and CryptoPunks have not been sold even once in 2023, and this year's NFT market is extremely lacking in liquidity. The top project Azuki has unfortunately stumbled at this time, completely wearing down users' patience and motivation to hold NFTs, plunging the entire market into a frozen abyss.

The total market value of the entire NFT market evaporated by 30% in just two weeks. The NFT OG blue-chip Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) and CryptoPunks have also been hit hard. Once reaching a floor price of 146 ETH, BAYC has now plunged below 30 ETH, prompting users to exclaim, "Haven't seen such cheap apes in a long time." The previously "unfazed" CryptoPunks were also affected by Azuki, suffering a 20% drop, with the floor price nearly breaking below 40 ETH.

Recently, Justin Bieber spent 500 ETH (approximately $1.31 million) to purchase BAYC #3001 in January 2022, which is now worth less than $60,000, resulting in a loss of over $1 million.

Yesterday, the second rarest BAYC #3953 (according to rarity.tools data) was sold for only 200 ETH (approximately $372,000), far below the peak prices of rare NFTs in this series. It is worth noting that in October 2021, the 16th rarest BAYC #8817 was sold at a Sotheby's auction for $3.4 million, becoming the most expensive BAYC ever sold.

Looking back two years, the year 2021, dubbed the "NFT Year," witnessed countless projects soaring and saw the total market value of the NFT market grow from 168,000 ETH to nearly 3,000 times that, reaching a peak of 5.06 million ETH by the end of the year. Even during the pandemic, which cast a gray panic over the world, "Non-Fungible Token" was named the word of the year by Collins Dictionary. Subsequently, many well-known domestic and international celebrities and institutions, including Curry and JJ Lin, purchased the then-popular BAYC and CryptoPunks NFTs at high prices, thus entering the Web3 world.

Can the stars who rode the NFT wave in 2021 imagine that such a grand and novel concept would fall from grace in just two years? This article will review those well-known celebrities who once held or still hold prominent NFT projects and briefly calculate how much they have lost in this market that has plunged into an abyss. "Stealing Bamboo Shoots.gif"

JJ Lin

JJ Lin is one of the celebrities who boarded the Web3 train during the "NFT Year." In March 2022, he posted a photo of a wallet featuring BAYC #3914 on his Twitter, thanking his friend Huang Licheng for gifting him the NFT.

According to transaction history, BAYC #3914 was acquired by Huang Licheng for 2.59 ETH and then gifted to JJ Lin. Tracking JJ Lin's wallet address on OpenSea shows that he had already started purchasing NFTs in 2021. He even bought CryptoPunks #8601 for a high price of 125 ETH in 2021, when ETH was at a historical high of $4,742, making that small image worth nearly $600,000. In today's disillusioned market, #8601 has shrunk to just $84,000, resulting in a loss of over $500,000 in assets for JJ Lin.

CryptoPunks #8601

As of now, JJ Lin owns a total of 111 digital collectibles, including projects like BAYC, CryptoPunks, Azuki, and Azuki Elemental.

In the past month, the value of JJ Lin's NFT portfolio has dropped from 152.71 ETH to 91.12 ETH, resulting in a cumulative loss of 40%. It is worth mentioning that while the reputation of Azuki Elementals was being dragged through the mud by the entire community, JJ Lin still minted six NFTs from that series on June 30, proving that he is indeed a man who has scheduled 23 domestic concerts this year and is quite willful.

Jay Chou

The word "pop" brings to mind both JJ Lin and Jay Chou for those born in the 90s and 00s. Understanding this, Huang Licheng also made sure to share the love, gifting a monkey to each. In April 2022, Jay Chou posted on Instagram that his BAYC #3738, gifted by Huang Licheng, was stolen by a phishing site. This NFT was subsequently resold for 130 WETH (approximately $440,000), 155 WETH (approximately $500,000), and 164.69 WETH (approximately $575,500). Prior to this, the highest sale price for this NFT was the 15 ETH that Huang Licheng paid when he acquired it. After staying in Jay Chou's wallet for just three months, its value skyrocketed tenfold, and the theft of the NFT can be said to have indirectly caused Jay Chou a loss of $500,000. However, for him, this is just a fraction of the sales from his 2020 hit "Mojito."

Always one to keep up with trends, Jay Chou established his own fashion brand and boosted his friend's milk tea shop. It makes sense that he would invest in NFTs. Unlike JJ Lin, Jay Chou did not become an "NFT shopping fanatic," but instead, he supported the creation of the NFT project Phanta Bear through his fashion brand PHANTACi, which is based on his own likeness.

After all, being "Jay Chou's bear," Phanta Bear had 4,944 holders on its launch day, and the project's total market value peaked a week later at 51,999.99 ETH.

Unlike Jay Chou's long-standing dominance in pop music for over twenty years, Phanta Bear, due to its fixed total supply, finally calmed down nearly two months after its release. In the recent turbulent NFT market, the floor price of Phanta Bear has dropped from a peak of 7.3 ETH to just 0.11 ETH. The deep bear curse is real; even Jay Chou couldn't change that.

Xu Jinglei

This one is even more heavyweight.

Xu Jinglei is one of the early players in the NFT space. In 2021, she changed her Instagram avatar to an Animetas series NFT, and curious friends quickly dug up her OpenSea account from her avatar. According to her holdings, Xu Jinglei had over 400 collectibles by 2022, and now she holds more than 1,300, including series like BAYC, MAYC, DeFi Apes, Azuki, and 6Sixty6.

If we only count BAYC and disregard gifting situations, Xu Jinglei has purchased BAYC five times. From her high-profile purchase of BAYC #1505 for 95 ETH on February 16 this year, it seems that Director Xu is the type to go all in when she sees something she likes. Based on the current market floor price and ETH/USD exchange rate, just these five apes have caused Xu Jinglei a loss of $220,000.

By extension, Xu Jinglei, who still holds and continues to invest in Azuki, 6Sixty6, and other series, has likely lost over $1 million.

Unlike Jay Chou and JJ Lin, whose accounts now mostly contain new series NFTs gifted by others, Xu Jinglei's account remains active in the trading market. According to NFTGO data, the gas fees alone for Xu Jinglei's account have reached 715.67 ETH, approximately $1.54 million. However, in a continuously declining market, active trading cannot reverse the reality of ongoing value loss in her portfolio. The turmoil of the past week has caused the value of Xu Jinglei's collection to drop from 715.59 ETH to 628.85 ETH. Nevertheless, Xu Jinglei seems to genuinely love "little pictures," as she has continued to purchase 40 new collectibles in the past week without being influenced by market sentiment.

Yoo Wen-Lok

Not all celebrities investing in NFT projects share Xu Jinglei's "pure love" for little pictures. Yoo Wen-Lok, also an early player in NFTs, primarily collects through gifts from others. For example, among the eight CryptoPunks he currently holds, only two were purchased by him (albeit at high prices of 70 ETH and 85 ETH). Just counting these two pixelated characters, Yoo Wen-Lok has lost $150,000.

With the popularity of "Jay Chou's bear" in early 2022, Yoo Wen-Lok also took advantage of the market heat to launch his personal NFT brand "ZombieClub Token," which sold out in less than two minutes, quickly claiming the top spot in trading on OpenSea and setting a record by selling out in just 2 hours and 42 minutes, with total sales reaching 35 million HKD, approximately $4.48 million. Goodness, it seems he would need to triple his losses over the years just to match that sales figure.

Unlike other celebrities, Yoo Wen-Lok's collection of little pictures does not seem to be purely for "collecting" or launching his own NFT brand. In 2021, he collaborated with the globally renowned auction house Christie’s to hold an event titled "No Time Like Present," selling CryptoPunks, BAYC, Meebits, and other collectibles, ultimately achieving a transaction total of 120 million HKD, approximately $15.6 million. It is worth noting that a year later, Christie's auction house sold a total of 87 NFTs for only $5.9 million.

Auctioning collectibles and establishing his own NFT brand makes it seem like Yoo Wen-Lok might have had some arbitrage intentions, especially since he profited nearly $20 million from it. Although the title mentions "losses," the more I write, the more it seems he hasn't really lost anything. Standing at the current ice point of the NFT market, even if all 382 collectibles he currently holds were to drop to zero, his past earnings might still be enough to cover the extreme losses from the market. I wonder if Yoo Wen-Lok, who views NFTs as an investment, is now glad about the choices he made at the market peak?

Cai Wensheng

On May 1, 2022, Cai Wensheng, chairman of the Hong Kong-listed Meitu Group, also bought a "Bored Ape" NFT. He posted on his social media, saying, "I was FOMOed and couldn't resist buying BAYC #8848."

Looking into Cai Wensheng's wallet address, OpenSea data shows that he currently holds four Bored Apes, with the cheapest of these four priced at 87 ETH, approximately $203,000. Of these four NFTs, Cai Wensheng personally purchased two: BAYC #8848 for 187 ETH (approximately $560,000) on May 1, and BAYC #8265 for 133.95 ETH (approximately $310,000) on May 13. Based on the current floor price and ETH/USD exchange rate, the value of these two BAYCs has now dropped to just $56,000, leading to a loss of $810,000 on these two monkeys for this "crypto trading veteran."

Bored Apes were not the starting point for Cai Wensheng's NFT investments; he had traded CryptoPunks as early as 2021. The five CryptoPunks he holds have an average final transaction price of around 110 ETH. Cai Wensheng purchased CryptoPunk #2558 for 125 ETH in August 2021, when the market price was $400,000, but its current value has dropped to just $80,000, resulting in an 80% evaporation of his investment.

Just three small images have caused this seasoned businessman to lose over $1.1 million. I wonder if, at that time, Cai Wensheng could resist the temptation and refrain from making reckless moves.

Zhu Xiaohu

On April 30, 2022, according to OpenSea data, an address named "allenzhu.eth" purchased "BAYC #9279" for 170 ETH (approximately $500,000), and the English name of Zhu Xiaohu, a managing partner at ZhenFund, is Allen Zhu. At the same time, Zhu Xiaohu's latest WeChat profile picture has also been updated to the "BAYC #9279" avatar.

OpenSea shows that BAYC #9279 has changed hands several times, eventually landing in a wallet account without a name. Given that Zhu Xiaohu recently posted a WeChat screenshot still using BAYC #9279, we still consider this NFT to belong to his account. This account is quite impressive, holding a total of 523 NFTs, all transferred from other addresses, and is heavily invested in BAYC, MAYC, and BACK, with 187 Bored Apes.

The current value of these 187 NFTs has "only" dropped to 5,760 ETH (approximately $10.93 million), representing an 80% evaporation from the peak value of 146 ETH for BAYC.

The wallet where Zhu Xiaohu purchased #9279 now contains only six NFTs from projects like Tatols NFT, WomenUnite Cold, and Life Beyond Origin Collection. Unlike Zhu Xiaohu's successful investments in the real world with Didi and Ele.me, four of the six NFT series he still holds have already dropped to zero, with the remaining two currently valued at only 0.188 ETH (approximately $357) and 0.3 MATIC (approximately $0.201).