Magic Eden Brings Pokemon into NFT Mainstream
Are you ready to catch em all, digitally? Magic Eden is ready to help, with their upcoming launch of tokenized Pokemon Cards. Find out more plus the latest in SocialFI.
TylerD's Market Summary
GM!
Today's top news includes:
Pokemon packs on Magic Eden
Winds soars and cools, sees new 20 ETH ATH sale
Yat debuts new NFT fantasy game
DraftKings Reignmakers week 6 packs drive $900k in sales, 2nd on leaderboard
BIGTIME token soars 300% in web3 gaming sector
💸 Magic Eden To Sell Pokemon Pack NFTs
Magic Eden wants its space in the "NFT marketplace wars" conversation.
And it's leaning into Real-World Assets (RWAs) to make it happen.
After a teaser on Tuesday, Magic Eden followed up yesterday with a major announcement -
They're launching digital Pokemon packs on their marketplace next week (Oct 18).
The Details
This is what we know:
What: Tokenized digital Pokemon Cards, 100 in supply sold in single-card packs (price still TBD)
Who: The drop is from Collector Crypt (in irl trading card collector bridge)
Where: On Magic Eden (Solana blockchain)
When: Oct 18
How: Physical cards are tokenized, then hidden and sold unrevealed as "packs"; they can be revealed, traded and physically redeemed after sale
So while these are called "packs" they are actually single cards which have been graded and are effectively "hidden" during the process so that they're minted randomly.
Per Collector Crypt, the cards are physically stored "in PSA, PWCC and ALT."
Some of the top cards in the pack, per the announcement:
2000 Pokemon Gym Challenge 1st Edition Holo Blaine’s Charizard #2
2006 Pokemon Ex Crystal Guardians Holo Charizard #4
2007 Pokemon Ex Power Keepers | Gold Star #100 Flareon-Holo
2018 Pokemon Japanese SM Promo | Munch: A Retrospective #209 Rowlet
Pending their PSA Grade (10 being highest), these rares could fetch $1,000-$5,000+ in traditional card markets.
So there will be a nice rare lotto on this mint which will likely sell out in seconds.
Why It Matters
First, a few reactions to this announcement, for Magic Eden:
While Magic Eden isn't the first to launch digital Pokemon cards (Courtyard launched a few weeks ago), they are the first of the "major" marketplaces to sell them.
This is bullish for Magic Eden and for the reach of these cards.
Magic Eden doesn't call them NFTs, instead "tokenized digital collectibles" and even describe them as a "new way to collect."
While this type of NFT is certainly new, collecting them is not, and the name tokenized digital collectibles can't be better than the term "NFTs" - right? Interesting to see them go this route.
Putting naming conventions aside, this is an exciting mint.
And the NFT space is desperate for exciting mints right now.
RWAs and tokenized physical cards unlocks a new product line and sector for Magic Eden - and potentially a big one.
Pokemon alone sold 9.7B cards in 2022, for $1.67B in revenue (and $480M in operating profit).
That doesn't even get into all the other types of physical cards that could be tokenized and sold if Magic Eden can prove out demand.
This is setup to be a win for Magic Eden (and perhaps even Solana) - as long as they can execute, and buyers show up.
We will be watching...
👥 Friend Tech Trend Tracker
Volume continues to trend down in the Friend Tech market as the lull continues, but Stars Arena dropped some major news for its backers.
Here are some of the core Friend Tech metrics for 10/12 and their day-over-day change:
Return users: 4,931 -> 4,588 (-7%)
Daily Buy volume: $2M -> $1.5M (-25%)
Total Volume: $3.9M -> $2.96M (-24%)
TVL*: $43.83M -> $43.54M (-1%)
Highest key: Vombatus 8.28 -> 8.33 (+1%)
*TVL in ETH terms 27,849 -> 26,650 ETH (-4%)
Volume fell hard on the day, now below $3M, as most remaining users are seemingly in hold mode. Key prices are mostly ranging on the low volume, trading within a pretty small range.
The big news of the day in SocialFi was from Stars Arena which made 2 big public statements. The details included:
They've written a new smart contract and are finalizing an audit
Contract will be open source, verified and paused ahead of go-live
Funds to close the gap have been secured
Just 6 hours later, news broke that the Stars Arena hacker had returned 90% of the funds in a surprise move. So Stars technically has 190% of the money they had.
The question now - what kind of "bonuses" will they send to users to encourage a return to the app?
A few other headlines from the day:
Bread launched a new alt for his tool (handle @frenfrenpro) which quickly soared to 0.3 ETH; holding that key provides access to his frenfren tool, and holding any combination of 3 across Bread, Favo or the new account provides access to one's entire room of holders
Racer confirmed that the team has been primarily focused on operations and security
More suspected CBB alts are popping up, with Jayson (@bacontatum) launching by buying 100 self keys and settling at 0.77 ETH
Machi was a winner on the day, with his key +13% to 3.25 ETH (12th on leaderboard)
Another SocialFi app farcaster went live on iOS
🚚 What else is happening in NFTs?
Here is the list of other notable headlines from the day in NFTs:
Trading volume fell 14% to $6.1M (3,900 ETH) on Tuesday; the leaderboard again saw a mix of red and green
Terraforms led top movers on the day +23% to 1.54, while Velocity Series fell 26% to 1.21 ETH as a notable loser on the day
Winds of Yawanawa briefly soared 30% on the day to 8 ETH before retracing to 7, though the collection did see a new ATH 20 ETH sale
Yesterday's Art Blocks Curated drop "because unless until" from ixnayokay minted out around the 0.15 ETH level and the floor held there in early trading
DraftKings Reignmakers dropped their Week 6 Rush Set Classic Packs yesterday, driving $896,000 in sales, enough for 2nd place on the daily NFT volume leaderboard (behind just DMarket and well ahead of any ETH NFT)
Yat is now offering Yat Fantasy, a free-to-play NFT fantasy collecting game, with a new competition which started yesterday
🌎 Around Crypto and Web3
A few other Crypto and Web3 headlines that caught my eye:
The crypto market fell again on Wednesday ahead of today's CPI print; BTC -1.7% at $26,760; ETH -1.6% at $1,550; SOL -4% at $21.36
The BIGTIME web3 gaming token soared 300% on its debut to a $1B FDV
Immutable and Amazon Web Services (AWS) are collaborating to push web3 gaming forward, offering enhanced support, resources, and platforms for developers with Amazon's ISV Accelerate Program; they partners are also working on a go-to-market strategy for games and studios, coming soon
REPUBLIK finalized a $6 million seed funding round to develop web3 creator tools; the funds will be used to further develop and enhance their tools and app which is in beta across iOS and Android
🚀 NFT Total Volume
BAYC (876 ETH, 25.5 ETH Floor)
MAYC (575 ETH, 4.93 ETH)
Azuki (376 ETH, 4.23 ETH)
Pudgy Penguins (295 ETH, 4.99 ETH)
Milady (254 ETH, 1.86 ETH)
📈 NFT Floor Price Increase
Latitudes (216%, 0.07 ETH Floor)
Terraforms (23%, 1.54 ETH)
Gutter Dogs (21%, 0.17 ETH)
Ether Avatars (17%, 0.15 ETH)
Rektguy (14%, 0.54 ETH)
🗓 Upcoming NFT Mints and Reveals
Today is a slower day of drops with a hyped mint coming on Nifty Gateway.
Artist Gabe Weis has gone semi-viral by creating unique pieces for NFT influencers and artists ahead of his project debut this evening. The art is Picasso-like and contains sarcastic phrases.
It will mint in packs, 260 in supply (10 1/1s and 50 5/5s) priced at $69 each.
See the full list and dive in for more details with Swizzy's daily mint monitor.
Kwhampa x Verse - Simple Thoughts (12:00 p.m. ET)
Cory Haber - Apophenies (12:00 p.m. ET)
Gabe Weis - The Blame Game (6:30 p.m. ET)
Enjoy this write-up and/or want to sponsor the Morning Minute? Follow along with me on Twitter @tyler_did_it or reach out via email tyler.warner@luckytrader.com.
For all volume and floor price data, see Lucky Trader's Project Rankings page.
For all upcoming mints, see Lucky Trader's NFT Calendar page.
Wow, interesting