- Kings of Leon became the first major rock band to release a special-edition album digitally as uniquely numbered NFTs.
- NFL quarterback Tom Brady is launching a company to produce NFTs.
- Christie’s auction house recently sold a digital collage by an artist known as Beeple for $69.3 million.
- NBA Top Shot issues digital basketball cards that feature a game highlight video; some have since sold for six figures.
“Some people have come at it like daily fantasy, some people like it’s a stock market, and other people like collecting,” says Luc “LG” Doucet, host of The First Mint, a podcast dedicated to Top Shot.
While Top Shot issues card packs starting at $9, the resale value can be much higher for individual cards, also called “moments.” Values can range from $4 to $250,000. If that seems like a huge amount of money for computer code, remember this: “The physical assets we hold don’t have real value; they’re also assigned,” Doucet says. “A baseball card is just a piece of cardboard.”
But be forewarned: It’s too soon to tell if NFTs are a serious investment or a fad, says Andrew Shirley, creator of the Knight Frank Luxury Investment Index. “There is no track record and, as tastes and fashions change, values could be very volatile.”
Shirley also advises that this isn’t an investment for novices. “It is important to understand exactly what it is you are owning, where that asset is being held and what the process for selling it to another buyer will be,” he says.
Prospective buyers would do best to “view it as a game and only play with money you can afford to lose,” Shirley notes.
