Asia’s Appetite for Gambling Fueling NFT Mania
The incredible momentum of Asia’s gambling industry continues to defy investor expectations. Even despite a difficult pandemic period where revenue flows were disrupted, staff was unable to work regular shift cycles, and customers from abroad were unable to enter the country. This appetite for gambling runs deep in the commercial offerings at major hotels and luxury resorts across Asia. A connection that appears now to transfer over and partially explain the meteoric rise in NFT purchase volumes across the continent.
The NFT movement gathered a lot of momentum throughout 2021, a few noteworthy collections include CryptoPunks, Bored Ape Yacht Club and the pieces produced by the artist Beeple. ©nickyandell72/Pixabay
The year in NFTs was punctuated by three major events that shook the art world to its core. The first was the Christies NFT auction for Beeple’s Everydays: the First 5000 Days, which was bought for $60.2M by the crypto entrepreneur MetaKovan, also known by his real name Vignesh Sundaresan. This enormous sale galvanised the market and saw projects like CryptoPunks skyrocket in value, with Punk #7523 selling for $11.7M at a Sotheby’s auction. Finally, in November Christie’s auctioned Beeple’s Human One for $28.9M.
Across the board, the value proposition of NFTs continues to validate itself. Consumers of digital content are being introduced to novel touchpoints with the brands and creators they love. Whether that’s through the dissemination of brand equity, real-world utility, or just for purely flexing with other members of the community. NFTs have captured the attention and interest of millions around the world, and now the rails have been built for high-fidelity metaverse experiences to be brought to the masses.
As the Asia gambling consumer trends clearly show, there are many thousands of new people joining the web3 movement over the course of this year. The appetite for gambling has clearly been a driver in the growth of the trend. NFTs are an intrinsically speculative assets, and they attract people with a desire to make a quick bargain and ultimately gamble on the outcome of a particular economic strategy.
Major Rise in Asian Buying Interest
A new generation of crypto native Asians with extreme levels of wealth have been driving demand for high-ticket NFT projects. Frantic bidding wars on the most sought-after pieces are commonplace, and a handful of collectors from Asia have become globally recognized for the rarity and value of their collections. The growth of the Asian cryptocurrency market has been fuelled by many factors, but perhaps none more important than the Binance cryptocurrency exchange, responsible for onboarding millions of new web3 users.
Artists from a younger generation have been doing particularly well, including Loie Hollowell, Jade Fadojutimi, Cinga Samson, and Trey Abdella, with their prices being propelled well above the suggested market level. Other variations on the hype train include buyers that have paid the fee for the artwork in cryptocurrency, rather than paying in traditional fiat currency. The biggest example of this was Banksy’s Love is in the Air, which was initially sold as the Girl with a Balloon, before being shredded live in the auction room.
The macro growth of the crypto markets has fuelled a major growth and push towards NFT widespread adoption. With crypto-rich individuals and organizations becoming increasingly active in the web3 marketplaces, NFT producers have found that they have a much broader customer base willing to buy into their project.
As more institutional investors enter the space and diversify their traditional art portfolios with highly sought-after NFT collections, it remains quite possible that all these projects are still very much in the price discovery phase. With the increased interest to participate and be a part of NFTs, producers are finding more creative vectors to market their products. It’s clear the Asian buyer market will continue to play an integral role in what is still to come.
