Why Are Buyers Forking Out $7 Million for NFTs Not Yet Minted?

Non-fungible token (NFT) investors have piled US$7 million into Tyler Hobbs’ “Incomplete Control” NFT collection, without being able to view them. Participants poured money into an auction to stand a chance to win one of 50 Golden Tokens, which will grant them ownership over unminted NFTs.

Yes, you read that right. Investors have put US$7 million into a Dutch auction that has sold 50 tokens to confer them ownership of NFTs they have not yet been able to view, and that will only be minted in December this year.

The artist behind the popular NFT series “Fidenza”, Hobbs will soon launch 100 one-of-a-kind NFTs in his latest collection, “Incomplete Control”, from December 9-13 at Bright Moments Gallery in New York.

NFT Madness Scales New Heights

On October 22, fans of Hobbs contributed 1,800 Ether (ETH), worth an estimated US$7 million, in exchange for 50 of the 100 “Golden Tokens”, which will grant holders ownership rights to one of the NFTs that will only be minted during the exhibition.

The Golden Tokens were sold through a Dutch auction hosted by Mirror Protocol that lasted only 90 minutes. Each token was priced at 500 ETH, scheduled to reduce every five minutes until it reached 5 ETH. All tokens sold were priced between 30 ETH (about US$120,000) and 80 ETH (about US$320,000).

The 50 remaining Golden Tokens will be randomly distributed on November 5 to 50 wallets of those who currently hold works from the artist’s earlier series, “Fidenza”, or the “CryptoCitizens” NFT projects. Owners who receive the tokens will be able to buy a 15 ETH “Incomplete Control” NFT at a 50 percent discount.

According to Hobbs, this new collection reflects the theme of control in the analogue and digital worlds. On his website, the artist says:

Every work takes a certain amount of time to achieve impact, another length of time to achieve understanding, and a further length of time to reach exhaustion. The forces of chaos and entropy give the natural world a certain warmth, and there are patterns and lessons there that we can use. I like to introduce these elements into the digital world, and Incomplete Control continues that work.

Tyler Hobbs

Do You Think the NFT Market is Overheated? Then Short It!

Many are starting to think the NFT market is overheated, with some NFTs fetching absolutely ridiculous amounts of money. Recently, an EtherRock, a simple grey and black illustration of a rock, sold for over US$100,000.

If you, like many, are sceptical as to the longevity of this craze, Singapore-based decentralised derivatives exchange SynFutures is launching NFTures, a product that will allow its users to short, or bet against, the future prices of NFTs. Currently, the only way to derive profit from NFTs is by buying or selling them, but SynFutures is looking at ways to change this.