Bored Ape Ethereum NFT Price Drops 32%, Down $135K Since Last Week

Last week, ahead of Saturday’s mint for NFT land for the upcoming Otherside metaverse game, everything was looking up in the Bored Ape Yacht Club ecosystem. The price of ApeCoin (APE) was surging, and NFTs themselves rose to record prices and sold briskly.

But while the land offering was a smashing success in terms of trading—with almost $1 billion to date between the initial mint and secondary sales—there's now been a downturn. Backlash to Yuga Labs’ sale format and its response has been swift, APE’s price has tanked, and now the original Bored Ape NFTs on Ethereum have dropped to the lowest entry price since March.

Currently, the cheapest available Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT on top marketplace OpenSea is listed for 105 ETH, or about $292,000. That’s a dramatic slide from the record price of 152 ETH, or nearly $429,000 set last Friday. It’s a drop of almost $137,000 in a matter of days.

The hype has apparently cooled off quickly. The NFT ecosystem was abuzz last week ahead of the sale for Otherdeed NFTs, which grant holders virtual land in Yuga Labs’ Otherside game. ApeCoin’s price popped as a result, while some people spent big on Bored Apes as they would be granted a free Otherdeed for owning one.

But after the sale, momentum slowed. APE is down 45% from its peak price last week, and the floor (or cheapest available) price for a Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT is now down nearly 32%. According to data from NFT Price Floor, it’s the first time in more than a month that Bored Apes have been available for under $300,000, since March 22.

All that said, the Bored Ape Yacht Club is still an immensely valuable project, and even at that floor price, the total combined value of the 10,000 NFTs stands at more than $2.9 billion. Per NFT Price Floor, it has the largest combined floor value of any NFT project, rising well above CryptoPunks, Mutant Apes, Moonbirds, and others.

Many of the NFTs are seen as more rare or desirable, and likely would sell for more than $292,000 worth of ETH. Some Bored Apes have sold for well over $1 million apiece.

An NFT works like a deed of ownership to a digital item—in this case, a profile picture or illustration of a disinterested ape. Each Bored Ape NFT has a unique set of traits and features, and owners can use their images to create products and projects, plus ownership comes with other benefits like merchandise, access to events, and free additional NFTs.

Over the past week, the Bored Ape Yacht Club itself has generated $142 million worth of NFT sales, per data from CryptoSlam, pushing the collection’s lifetime total past $2 billion. Including Mutant Apes and Mutant Serum NFTs, plus Bored Ape Kennel Club NFTs, the wider project (excluding Otherside land) has yielded nearly $4 billion worth of total secondary trades.