It's kind of like Spotify. Did you see those bozos protesting for a penny a stream? Spotify would be bankrupt nearly instantly. Not that musicians are good with math. But you can't get more money than a company has, literally impossible.
So these purchasers of NFTs made a boatload on cryptocurrency. Come on, even you've seen that news. About the price of Bitcoin. What did I read, someone paid for a pizza with a Bitcoin and if he still had it today he'd have 50k. BUT HE DOESN'T!
You see crypto is a long game. Hell, if I owned it, I would have sold it after it went into the twenties and dropped down near ten. But if you've got more money than you know what to do with, especially if you're diversified, you believe in digital currency and want to make beaucoup bucks in the future. It's not that different from being a venture capitalist. Quick, are you a VC? Could you handle that success ratio? Maybe one in twenty hit and you're rolling in dough. Look at Masayoshi Son and SoftBank, talk about a violent seesaw. He bought Sprint, he bought WeWork, he's famous for doing little due diligence, he just gives you the cash and tells you to spend it. And he's looking for big wins, not little ones. That's another thing the hoi polloi don't know about business. That there's too much cost in hitting singles. Best to spend the money for home runs, at least if they happen you can make big money. Kind of like movies and music. You want to make a movie for a million dollars, make a record for $100. And if you double your money, you're dancing, ecstatic! But those victories cannot sustain a major enterprise, the costs are too heavy. Do these major enterprises sometimes miss cheap productions which make bank? Of course! This is what disruption is all about. Clayton Christensen said the new product is cheap and inferior but ultimately it gets better and the new enterprise topples the old, unless the old enterprise topples itself, or buys all the new product, which happens in movies and music, if the big guys come along almost all of the small guys will sell out, irrelevant of the possible upside, they want that cash up front.
So, if you speculated in Bitcoin and made all that money... You're a speculator at heart, you're willing to take risks, what are your new opportunities? NFTs!
You're reading about these immense sales numbers, like with Beeple. That Beeple NFT was purchased by a guy who made so much money in cryptocurrency that he decided to invest some of it in this new area, NFTs. He'd already purchased a bunch of the artist's work. Will NFTs ultimately be worth something? WHO KNOWS!
Of course there are the idiots blowing their money on well-distributed sports clips. Never underestimate the ability of the unsophisticated to blow their cash. Like with GameStop. Sure, the man on the street showed Wall Street it is vulnerable, but almost all the profits went to Wall Street, which knows how to ride a rise and the subsequent fall. You can make money on anything if you know where it's going. And everybody inside knew GameStop was overvalued, EVERYBODY!
As for NFTs and art... As has also been well-documented, the value of art became detached from the physical product eons ago. Art is an investment vehicle, sometimes the purchasers don't even display it! So, an enterprise that is already detached from reality is ripe for movement into a financial product that is detached from reality. Then again, there's the sale of NFTs for ephemeral or digital art to begin with. I won't go down that rabbit hole because it doesn't apply to you.
What we've got is a lot of sellers, or potential sellers, with no knowledge of the buyers. These crypto speculators disappear and the value of your NFT goes down to NOTHING! If you can't sell something, that's what it's worth.
It was too good to be true. Selling essentially nothing for big bucks.
But maybe this nothing will have value in the future, it's possible. Or maybe the buyers will create a market detached from reality, like with fine art. Is this a game for you? OF COURSE NOT!
And when those without previous relationships with crypto kings/buyers have tried to sell NFTs...in many cases they've fallen flat. Like the Kings of Leon. There was some mania so fans bought a few, but this is not what the crypto investors want to pay for.
It was a momentary blip. It's just a matter of when it crashes. I believe it's crashed already, or will very soon. It just makes no sense. Who wants to buy this stuff? You don't even get a Beanie Baby!
Are you in the physical game or the money game? Do you make products or do you invest in products? These are radically different enterprises. Don't equate an hour of work at the factory, in the recording studio, to finance. So much of Wall Street is legalized gambling. Now, more than ever. It's no place for amateurs. Ever talk to an elite athlete? PGA Tour golfers play a completely different game than you do, even if your handicap is zero. They're working the ball in ways you can't even think of. And they compete under pressure that would have you shanking almost every shot. But when it comes to NFTs, it's all just easy money, it's a flat landscape, you understand it as well as the players. OF COURSE NOT!
What is the real story. That's what my father taught me to figure out. If someone is driving a hundred thousand dollar car and doesn't have a job...either they inherited a ton of money or they stole it or borrowed it. Never accept the exterior for what it appears. Try to peel back the layers and try to understand it.
And the amazing thing is there's so much information out there, assuming you're willing to put in the time to find it and read it.
But people would rather hang with their buddies and dream up schemes that will net them millions.
Ain't gonna happen.
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