Due to a generally bearish cryptocurrency market that had a negative impact on sales in the worldwide NFT market, OpenSea volume continued to drop in August. After peaking at almost $5 billion in January, OpenSea sales plunged sharply in August, generating only $502 million, a decline of 89% in just seven months.
While the platform's all-time high was reached in January 2022, OpenSea's peak was reached in August 2021 with $3 billion. The amount for last month was down 5% from the $529 million it had been the month before and was down 85% over the previous year.
Sales of the top collections on OpenSea are dramatically dropped
Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), Otherdeed for Otherside, Mutant Ape Yacht Club (MAYC), CryptoPunks, and Moonbirds are some of the most popular collections on OpenSea.
Last month, the number of unique buyers for Bored Apes, the top collection on OpenSea, fell to its second-lowest point. Sales fell below $60 million for the second month in a row despite an increase in average sales value from less than $110,000 in June and July to $132,598 in August. Total transactions also remained below 500.
Although CryptoPunks continues to be a top NFT collection, sales volume has dropped throughout 2022. This year, the collection's monthly sales have not reached $150 million, with its high point in January coming in at $124 million. Volume fell to a 19-month low in August with approximately $25 million.
OpenSea volume and NFT global market sales are correlated
Monthly volume has consistently decreased on NFT marketplaces, and the same trend has been seen in global NFT sales.
As OpenSea recorded $502 million in August, global sales fell by 7% from July's $682 million to about $634 million.
The NFT bears: Will they continue?
LivelyVerse's Parsa Abbasi gave his opinion on the NFT market's future.
“We cannot deny the fact that it is a bear market, and the bear market affects the whole crypto space. NFTs, too, are a part of this space. Besides that, there are other reasons. For one , the season and owners seeing losses rather than profits could be one reason. Still, we should never forget that in financial markets, herding behavior is widespread. When stocks, tokens, or NFTs start to bring money to investors, other people bring money in with no other reason than hoping for a profit too – and that is what causes the market crash.”
He concluded, “In my opinion, people should invest their money in valuable things and viable projects and make investment decisions based on logic. I believe that digital apes are not a good choice. It should be something that is a store of value. As the crisis and downturn are ahead, investors are turning their attention to bonds. So it is expected that money does not stay in NFTs. After all, it could be a stress test for non-fungibles where we will see if they could be a store of value — or not.”
