A trader just made $13m selling an early Ethereum NFT collection – DL News

A high-value NFT trader has just realised a $13 million profit after selling 10 early Ethereum NFTs they bought three years prior.

The pseudonymous trader, who goes by the name OldSchoolCollection on NFT marketplace OpenSea, bought 10 NFTs from the Autoglyphs collection for a combined $1.4 million in February 2021.

Today, OldSchoolCollection sold the same 10 Autoglyphs for 5,000 Ether — worth around $14.5 million — to a private collector via NFT brokerage platform Fountain.

According to Fountain, the sale marks one of the biggest NFT trades recorded onchain.

What are Autoglyphs?

Autoglyphs are among the first generative art NFTs created on the Ethereum network.

Generative art refers to art created using an autonomous system, often through code deployed on a blockchain.

The collection of 512 Autoglyphs was launched in 2019 by Larva Labs of CryptoPunks fame. Anyone who was willing to donate the creation fee of 0.2 Ether — around $35 at the time — could obtain one.

The Autoglyphs art is entirely onchain, meaning that all the data needed to display the NFTs is stored directly on the Ethereum blockchain.

Other popular generative art collections on Ethereum include Fidenza by Tyler Hobbs and Chromie Squiggle by Snowfro.

Certain NFTs make a comeback

NFTs have historically been some of the riskiest bets in the crypto market.

A roaring NFT bull run from 2021 to early 2022 saw the NFT market hit $11.8 billion in value, according to data and business intelligence platform Statista.

But many of the previously top traded collections plummeted in value throughout 2023. Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs, which found popularity among celebrities such as Jimmy Fallon, Paris Hilton and Snoop Dogg, have dropped more than 80% from their 2022 peak in Ether terms.

But despite many prominent NFTs failing to bounce back, there are pockets of activity.

Pudgy Penguins, a collection popular with Ethereum developers, have rallied 233% since the start of 2023. Feeding into their popularity was the decision by Dymension, a network for easy deployment of application-specific blockchains, to include Pudgy Penguin owners in its recent token airdrop.

Today’s high-profile Autoglyphs sale could also help rekindle interest in other generative art NFTs.

Tim Craig is DL News’ Edinburgh-based DeFi Correspondent. Reach out to him with tips at tim@dlnews.com.