With the crypto derivatives platform, FTX’s very own non-fungible token [NFT] marketplace, its CEO Sam Bankman-Fried has turned into a digital artist. The exec’s first-ever NFT was a hand-written word “Test” on a graphic editor program and was sold for a whopping $270,000. This evidenced the soaring NFT boom that shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
Earlier, the crypto exchange had enabled users to mint custom NFTs on their platform. As a result, the new NFT marketplace was spammed with an enormous amount of pictures of fish following the launch. In a bid to reduce spam, FTX changed its NFT submission fee to $500.
The billionaire exec’s tweet regarding the same read,
“Due to the massive number of submissions, too many of which were just a picture of a fish, we are now charging a one-time $500 fee to submit NFTs. Hopefully, this will reduce spam.”
The community reacted strongly against it pointing out that the massive fee structure would deter struggling artists from using the NFT platform. As a response to this, the fee was reduced to $10 just hours later.
FTX’s NFT ecosystem
NFTs have been in there since as early as 2017. However, it managed to generate an astonishing speculative bubble this year, with some pieces selling for tens of millions of dollars. To capitalize on the thriving sector’s parabolic growth, FTX enabled the ability to mint NFTs directly on the exchange. According to the CEO, all the NFTs will be cross-chain, across the Ethereum and Solana blockchains.
On the other hand, Bankman-Fried also revealed that the deposits and withdrawals are expected to be rolled out in the coming weeks, which could initiate the capability of depositing external NFTs onto the platform.
FTX isn’t the only crypto exchange to diversify its offerings into this space. Its rival Binance had earlier launched its own NFT marketplace after teaming up with the likes of singer-songwriter Lewis Capaldi and artist Trevor Jones in addition to soccer players Michael Owen and Alphonso Davies.