{"id":6886,"date":"2021-03-13T15:29:17","date_gmt":"2021-03-13T20:29:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cointelegraph.com\/magazine\/?p=6886"},"modified":"2021-03-20T14:53:59","modified_gmt":"2021-03-20T18:53:59","slug":"beeple-millions-banksy-profits-kingsofleon-problems-030713","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cointelegraph.com\/magazine\/2021\/03\/13\/beeple-millions-banksy-profits-kingsofleon-problems-030713","title":{"rendered":"NFT special! Beeple\u2019s millions, Banksy profits, problems for Kings of Leon: Hodler\u2019s Digest, March 7\u201313"},"content":{"rendered":"

Coming every Saturday, <\/i><\/b>Hodler\u2019s Digest<\/i><\/b><\/a> will help you track every single important news story that happened this week. The best (and worst) quotes, adoption and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions and much more \u2014 a week on Cointelegraph in one link.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Top Stories This Week<\/b><\/h2>\n

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Beeple NFT auction closes at record-setting $69.3 million<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

There\u2019s plenty to discuss in the crypto markets, but this week, nonfungible tokens have stolen the limelight\u2026 for multiple reasons.<\/span><\/p>\n

Digital artist Mike Winkelmann, also known as Beeple, has made history after his latest piece \u2014 \u201cEverydays: The First 5000 Days\u201d \u2014 sold for a whopping $69.3 million following an auction at Christie\u2019s.<\/b><\/p>\n

Only two other living artists, Jeff Koons and David Hockney, have created more expensive works\u2026 and as you might expect, this is the priciest NFT ever sold.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a pretty special one at that. \u201cEverydays\u201d consists of 5,000 unique images, produced every day for 13-and-a-half years. <\/span>The collage shows Beeple\u2019s evolution as an artist and his shift to becoming a political cartoonist.<\/b><\/p>\n

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NFT representing incinerated Banksy painting fetches nearly $400,000<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

Beeple isn\u2019t the only one laughing all the way to the crypto exchange. <\/span>A group of crypto investors known as \u201cBurnt Banksy\u201d has made a tidy profit after a daring stunt involving one of the graffiti artist\u2019s creations.<\/b><\/p>\n

They bought a real-life Banksy painting for <\/span>$100,000 <\/b>last month. \u201cMorons\u201d satirizes the art industry and depicts a bustling auction for a framed canvas, adorned with the words: \u201cI can\u2019t believe you morons buy this shit.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Last week, they set the painting on fire during a Twitter livestream in Brooklyn\u2026 and turned it into an NFT instead. <\/b>Now, it\u2019s sold on the NFT marketplace OpenSea for 228 ETH\u2026 worth over <\/span>$400,000 <\/b>at the time of writing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Other big sales this week included a former DC Comics artist who made <\/span>$1.85 million <\/b>in four days by selling <\/span>Wonder Woman NFTs<\/span><\/a>. <\/span>But not everyone has a price. <\/b>A collector <\/span>turned down<\/span><\/a> a staggering <\/span>$1 million <\/b>for an NBA Top Shot moment they originally bought for <\/span>$100,000<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cBreaking new ground is never easy\u201d \u2014 Kings of Leon\u2019s NFT sale takes in $2 million<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

Kings of Leon have reportedly made a cool <\/span>$2 million <\/b>through sales of their tokenized album \u2014 with <\/span>$600,000 <\/b>going to a fund that\u2019s designed to support live music crews affected by the coronavirus pandemic.<\/span><\/p>\n

Alas, the event hasn\u2019t been without teething problems. <\/b>Many of the band\u2019s fans are complete newcomers to crypto and NFTs \u2014 and it can be a steep learning curve. This prompted Kings of Leon to extend their sale to March 20.<\/span><\/p>\n

The NFTs have been released in collaboration with YellowHeart, a blockchain-based ticketing platform that is handling the auction on NFT marketplace OpenSea.<\/span><\/p>\n

Six golden tickets have been released \u2014 giving fans front row seats for life, their own driver to gigs, and the chance to enjoy meet-and-greets with the band. <\/b>One of the golden tickets fetched a whopping <\/span>89 ETH<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

In other music news, the Russian punk feminist group Pussy Riot <\/span>has revealed<\/span><\/a> it is releasing four NFTs for its latest single to support a shelter for victims of domestic violence.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Bitcoin hits new record highs after agonizing two-week wait<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

What a difference a year makes. Twelve months ago, Bitcoiners were licking their wounds after a devastating flash crash that took it below <\/span>$4,000<\/b>. Fast forward to now, and BTC has now set a new all-time high above <\/span>$59,000.<\/b><\/p>\n

It took a couple of weeks to reach this milestone, with BTC falling below $45,000 along the way. <\/b>But the bounceback indicates that bullish momentum remains unshaken. What remains to be seen is whether this spike is the product of weekend volatility, or the start of something bigger.<\/span><\/p>\n

Of course, there are reasons to be cautious. <\/b>ExoAlpha\u2019s David Lifchitz said this week that, despite Bitcoin\u2019s price being in a long-term uptrend, there are some reasons for a more bearish outlook for the short term.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Tax season in the U.S. could prompt investors to sell off their holdings. <\/b>It\u2019s also March, traditionally a bearish month for the crypto sector.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Solution to scale Ethereum \u2018100X\u2019 is imminent and will get us through until Eth2, Vitalik says<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

With DeFi protocols flocking to rival blockchains \u2014 with Binance Smart Chain a big beneficiary of this exodus \u2014 Ethereum needs to take swift action to boost capacity and clamp down on sky-high transaction fees.<\/span><\/p>\n

Eth2 remains some time away yet, but Vitalik Buterin has revealed that a temporary fix may be just around the corner: rollups.<\/b><\/p>\n

Speaking on <\/span>The Tim Ferriss Show<\/span><\/i> podcast, he said Optimism\u2019s layer-two solution could help Ethereum scale by a factor of 100. <\/span>And by the time any additional capacity is needed, sharding \u201cwill have already been ready for a long time by then,\u201d Buterin added.<\/b><\/p>\n

Rollups process and store transaction data on a designated sidechain before bundling batches of transactions together onto Ethereum\u2019s mainnet. <\/span>This helps mitigate the blockchain\u2019s scaling woes, where fierce competition for bandwidth on the Ethereum mainnet has resulted in exorbitant fees.<\/b><\/p>\n

Optimism\u2019s solution is set to launch in about a month, and the rollups are expected to be embraced by industry leaders in DeFi, with rumors suggesting the feature will be heavily utilized by V3 of Uniswap.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Winners and Losers<\/b><\/h2>\n

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At the end of the week, Bitcoin is at <\/span>$60,539<\/b>, Ether at <\/span>$1,936 <\/b>and XRP at <\/span>$0.44<\/b>. The total market cap is at <\/span>$1.8 trillion<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Among the biggest 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoin gainers of the week are <\/span>Chiliz<\/b>, <\/span>Theta Fuel <\/b>and <\/span>Ankr<\/b>. The top three altcoin losers of the week are <\/span>NEM<\/b>, <\/span>Fantom <\/b>and <\/span>Voyager Token<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Most Memorable Quotations<\/b><\/h2>\n

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\u201cGold\u2019s ability to hedge against inflation has been somewhat exaggerated. While it is a reasonable store of value over the very long-term \u2014 think centuries \u2014 it is less reliable across most investment horizons.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Russ Koesterich<\/b><\/a>, BlackRock portfolio manager<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cThe fact that Oracle hasn\u2019t bought \u2018yet\u2019 is very bullish and signalling how early it still is.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Jeff Booth<\/b><\/a>, entrepreneur<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cTesla in Rear View, About $80,000 Bitcoin Eyes Amazon Market Cap \u2014 Once Bitcoin\u2019s back-and-fill process around the $1 trillion market cap is complete, we see internet pioneer Amazon.com as a potential next threshold.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Mike McGlone<\/b><\/a>, Bloomberg Intelligence analyst<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cLet\u2019s Make History together with the first ever NFT for REAL ESTATE!\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ivan Malpica<\/b><\/a>, investor<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cYou\u2019d have over $10,000 if you bought #bitcoin with your stimulus check.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

@BitcoinStimulus<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

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\u201cDOGE does certainly already have a use case as a niche currency with avid fans, and adoption can certainly grow from here. But for it to genuinely be considered \u2018future money,\u2019 the narrative of DOGE as a meme coin will have to erode.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Kadan Stadelmann<\/b><\/a>, Komodo chief technology officer<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cLast year, @Ripple and I sued @YouTube for failing to enforce its own policies by allowing fake accounts (impersonating my\/Ripple\u2019s verified accounts) to conduct XRP giveaway scams. We\u2019ve now come to a resolution to work together to prevent, detect and take down these scams.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Brad Garlinghouse<\/b><\/a>, Ripple CEO<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cRollups are coming very soon. We\u2019re fully confident that by the time that we need any more scaling of that, sharding will have already been ready for a long time by then.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Vitalik Buterin<\/b><\/a>, Ethereum co-founder<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cGold will always have a place in jewelry and coin collections, but most indicators point to an accelerating pace of Bitcoin replacing the metal as a store of value in investor portfolios.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Mike McGlone<\/b><\/a>, Bloomberg senior commodity strategist<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s so cool to see women and girls in the cryptocurrency space. It\u2019s important for us to have empowered financial futures.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Lily Knight<\/b><\/a>, three-year-old Bitcoin educator<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cIf blockchain designs and infrastructure get done at the enterprise level and there aren\u2019t enough women, there won\u2019t be anything created by female thinking patterns. This is the biggest issue we face today.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Efi Pylarinou<\/b><\/a>, blockchain and fintech adviser<\/b><\/p>\n

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\u201cEven if you dislike Bitcoin, you should still buy it just in case it pans out.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Dan Held, Kraken<\/b><\/p>\n

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Prediction of the Week<\/b><\/h2>\n

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Mark Cuban sees $1 written in DOGE\u2019s tea leaves<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

Just three days after the Dallas Mavericks started accepting Dogecoin for merchandise, the basketball team\u2019s billionaire owner, Mark Cuban, was exceedingly bullish.<\/span><\/p>\n

The <\/b>Shark Tank<\/i><\/b> star is predicting that DOGE\u2019s price will eventually hit $1\u2026 meaning Elon Musk isn\u2019t the only megarich entrepreneur who\u2019s in love with the joke coin.<\/b><\/p>\n

Last weekend, he said customers had used more than 20,000 DOGE in transactions with the Dallas Mavericks, making it \u201cthe largest Dogecoin merchant in the world.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The Mavericks were one of the first NBA franchises to recognize crypto as a form of payment for tickets and merchandise, having started accepting Bitcoin through wallet company BitPay two years ago.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

Fans can also pay for gear and souvenirs with Bitcoin Cash, USD Coin, Gemini Dollar, Paxos Standard and Binance USD.<\/span><\/p>\n

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FUD of the Week\u00a0<\/b><\/h2>\n

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OpenSea collector \u201cpulls the rug\u201d on NFTs to highlight arbitrary value<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

Returning to NFTs now, and some are expressing fears that the market is overheated \u2014 and engaging in daring stunts to prove their point.<\/span><\/p>\n

A crypto artist known as \u201cNeitherconfirm\u201d listed 26 NFTs for sale on OpenSea, featuring people and animal faces in a stained glass style. <\/b>But things took an unexpected turn on Tuesday when they changed the images associated with each token into photos of literal carpets.<\/span><\/p>\n

Neitherconfirm said no one was hurt by the move, explaining: \u201cAll discussions about the value of NFTs are meaningless as long as the token is not inseparable from the artwork itself. <\/span>What is the meaning of creating an unforgeable token on a highly secured network if somebody can alter, relink or destroy your possession? <\/b>As long as the value of your artwork is reliable on a central service you do not own anything.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Peter Schiff\u2019s son moves 100% of his portfolio into Bitcoin<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

We\u2019ve known for a long time that Peter Schiff is a crypto skeptic and a gold bug. <\/span>But this week, his son made a powerful statement that shows he couldn\u2019t agree less with his father.<\/b><\/p>\n

Spencer Schiff seems to have decided to move his portfolio investments into Bitcoin, with his dad expressing concern after he went all in. Peter wrote: <\/span>\u201cIf my own son is this brainwashed imagine how vulnerable most kids are. He\u2019s HODLing to infinity or bust.\u201d\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

Snarky comments came in thick and fast, with Morgan Creek Digital co-founder Anthony Pompliano replying: <\/span>\u201cAt least someone in your family is growing their wealth this year.\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n

Schiff went on to suggest that he needs to disinherit his son: <\/span>\u201cOtherwise he will squander my hard earned wealth on more Bitcoin.\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n

His criticisms of BTC have often proven to be well off the mark. Indeed, in 2019, he confidently declared that the world\u2019s biggest cryptocurrency would never hit <\/span>$50,000<\/b>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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Ripple ends YouTube lawsuit over XRP giveaway scams, says CEO<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

As the SEC lawsuit over the sale of XRP tokens rumbles on, Ripple is dialing down its legal action elsewhere. <\/span>This week, the company announced that it has ended its lawsuit against YouTube for the video-sharing site\u2019s alleged complicity in a spate of XRP giveaway scams.<\/b><\/p>\n

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse had taken YouTube to task for \u201cfailing to enforce its own policies by allowing fake accounts to conduct XRP giveaway scams\u201d \u2014 fraudulent profiles that often impersonated his official page or other verified Ripple channels. <\/span>Both sides have now reached a resolution that will see them work together to \u201cprevent, detect and take down these scams.\u201d<\/b><\/p>\n

On Twitter, he added: \u201c<\/span>Social platforms are starting to acknowledge their role in allowing crypto scams to persist and recognize the need to be part of the solution.\u201d<\/b>In other developments, Ripple and Moneygram have <\/span>officially terminated<\/span><\/a> their partnership, but both companies expressed hope that they\u2019ll get to work together again in the future.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Best Cointelegraph Features<\/b><\/h2>\n

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Too little, too late? Ethereum losing DeFi ground to rival blockchains<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

Decentralized exchanges explore alternatives as Ethereum continues to be overloaded. Is this the beginning of the end for the blockchain?<\/span><\/p>\n

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Black Thursday anniversary: Can crypto markets see another huge crash?<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

The market may witness flash crashes in the near term, and another March 12 drop is not completely off the map.<\/span><\/p>\n

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True or false? A single NFT can power a European household for 1.5 months<\/b><\/a><\/h4>\n

NFTs are coming under scrutiny as more attention is drawn to the carbon footprint of PoW blockchains.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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For more info on crypto prices, make sure to read <\/span>Cointelegraph\u2019s market analysis<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n