The NFT industry, which has a market share of 3 billion dollars during the pandemic period, is going through turbulent days. The ‘Bored Ape Yacht Club’ NFT collection, which made its name with sales of 24.4 million dollars, has lost 30 percent in the last 24 hours. The decline in interest in the collection developed by Yuga Labs came after the company announced in a court that there was no “copyright registration” for the 10,000-image collection. The statement questioned the reliability of the NFT artifacts.
The NFT industry, which has achieved great turnover during the pandemic period, is facing a turbulent period. While some collections are making significant gains, many are in decline. Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), which stands out in the NFT world, has lost 30 percent in the last 24 hours, while Doodles, an Ethereum-based project, increased by 100 percent.
The Bored Ape Yacht Club collection, produced by Delaware-based Yuga Labs, broke a record in September 2021, selling for $24.4 million. The decline in the NFT series comes after lawsuits involving the Yuga Labs company at its headquarters. A California law firm accused Yuga Labs of using celebrities to increase the value of the work, while the company filed a lawsuit against its partner artist Ryder Ripps, who developed the NFTs.
Upon Ripss’ request to prove the copyright of the company in the case before the US Federal Court, Yuga Labs announced that there was no “copyright registration” for the NFT collection consisting of 10 thousand images in the last hearing. The company’s statement, which went into court records, ignited new discussions about NFT artifacts.
TARGET OF CLAIMS OF FRAUD
Although still among the most popular NFT collections on the market, the ‘Bored Ape Yacht Club’ collection has recently experienced a decline in popularity. The project has seen a 30 percent drop in sales volume over the last 24 hours, with a sales value down 12 percent to $1.1 million. Celebrities, meanwhile, are facing class action lawsuits from California lawyers for promoting their Bored Ape NFT. Among them are Justin Bieber, Madonna, Steph Curry and Paris Hilton. The lawsuit, filed in California in December, alleges the celebrities violated state and federal laws.
The lawsuit alleges that the company’s talent manager, Guy Oseary, asked celebrities to publicly support the ‘Bored Ape’ collection in exchange for funds sent through MoonPay. The company, which denies the allegations, continues to publish new collections, including the recently released ‘Sewer Pass’, as well as grappling with many lawsuits.
97 PERCENT DECREASE IN 2022
NFTs, which we started to hear frequently in the first months of 2021 in the shadow of the pandemic, and which means ‘unique, unchangeable digital assets’, paved the way for digitalization in the art world and solidified its place with the emergence of many different uses. NFTs, chosen as the ‘word of the year’ in 2021, created a market of 3 billion dollars. US artist Beeple’s ‘Everydays: The First 5000 Days’ became the most expensive NFT ever, with sales of $69.3 million, and drew the world’s attention to NFTs. 2022, on the other hand, has been painful and pessimistic in the cryptocurrency and NFT market.
According to data shared by Dune Analytics, the NFT sector, which peaked at $17 billion at the beginning of 2022, dropped to $466 million in September, down 98 percent. Behind this decline, it is thought that traditional sales methods, which were interrupted during the pandemic period, started to recover after normalization.