- Ethereum faces a decline in sales volume, marking a departure from its traditional dominance in the NFT marketplace.
- Solana gains prominence in the competitive NFT space, recording higher trading volumes than Ethereum after the execution of a significant $165 million airdrop by the liquid staking protocol Jito.
The Web3 landscape reveals a noteworthy transformation in the NFT marketplace, signaling a departure from Ethereum’s traditional dominance. Ethereum, a longstanding leader in NFT trading, is experiencing a decline in sales volume as it contends with the emergence of two formidable competitors – Bitcoin and Solana.
The Bitcoin network has become a focal point for digital art collectible trading, driven by a sustained interest in ordinal inscriptions. Ordinals offer users the ability to mint NFT-like assets directly on the Bitcoin blockchain. Over the past month, this asset class has witnessed an impressive 500% surge in sales volume, outpacing Ethereum’s performance during the same period.
The allure of Bitcoin’s cost-effective ordinal inscriptions has generated a substantial surge in demand on the network, signifying a broader shift in the digital collectibles market. Novel and economically efficient methods of NFT creation and trading are gaining momentum, challenging the established norms.
Adding to the evolving landscape, the Solana blockchain has seized attention by recording higher NFT trading volumes than Ethereum on Friday. This surge in Solana’s trading activity represents the pinnacle of a remarkable week for the network, underlining its growing significance in the competitive NFT space. Speaking on this development to Blockworks, Sarah Satoshi, the head of business development at ordinals marketplace Gamma.io, said:
“Something that’s obviously interesting and different in the ordinals space versus every other popular blockchain is that your NFTs are actually stored on-chain versus in smart contracts-enabled ecosystems, [where]they’re stored on some decentralized server like IPFS. I think that’s one of the factors that attracts a lot of people.”
Solana’s Recent Surge In NFT Industry
In a significant development this week, the liquid staking protocol Jito executed a substantial airdrop, dispersing a staggering $165 million worth of its native tokens to users on Thursday. The repercussions of this event were felt swiftly, as Solana experienced a surge in NFT sales the following day, processing transactions totaling nearly $15 million.
The heightened activity extended to Tensor, a Solana-based NFT market, prompting speculation of another potential airdrop. The anticipation may have fueled the increased engagement on the platform, as users sought to capitalize on potential rewards.
On Friday, “Tensorians,” an NFT collection native to Solana, emerged as the leader on the sales volume charts, as reported by CryptoSlam. The collection’s sales volume witnessed a remarkable increase of over 100% in the past week, underlining the growing popularity and demand for Solana-based NFTs.
In a separate development, the NFT collection Pudgy Penguins made waves by unveiling an online open-world game named Pudgy World Alpha during Art Basel Miami. The game allows players to control avatar lookalikes of the beloved penguins. Notably, ownership of an NFT is not a prerequisite for participation in the game.
Pudgy World builds upon the NFT collection’s innovative partnership that brought toy versions of Pudgy Penguins to Walmart stores. Each physical toy is accompanied by a QR code that claims a corresponding Pudgy Penguin character within Pudgy World. The project announced that every toy aligns with a Pudgy Penguins NFT, and holders receive licensing royalties for their associated toys, marking a unique intersection of the physical and virtual realms in the NFT space.
