Nine rare non-fungible token (NFT) digital collectibles known as CryptoPunks will be sold by the physical auction house Christieâs, according to a Twitter announcement on Thursday.
- The digital collectibles are from marketplace Larva Labs's own collection, and are set to feature in the 255-year-old auction house's "21st Century Evening Sale" next month in New York city.
- All nine CryptoPunks are from mints below 1,000, meaning they were created in the earliest days of the company's digital collectibles.
- The mint numbers include 2, 532, 58, 30, 635, 602, 768, 603 and 757, with a "rare alien" collectible to be included in the auction also.
- The announcement signals that NFTs continue to be legitimized by establishment art firms, even as athletes and musicians also ramp up their participation in the NFT space.
- Rival auction house Sotheby's, which was founded 22 years before Christie's, will also sell NFT art later this month.
- NFTs are digital cryptocurrency tokens that can take on various attributes to represent artwork or assets online, as can be seen in CryptoPunks such as Mohawk Thin and Frumpy Hair.
- Christie's sold an NFT representing digital artist Beeple's work for $69 million last month, setting a record for the NFT space. The auction house accepted ether for the sale.
- In February, a batch of 34 NFTs was purchased by a whale who paid 557.5 ETH (roughly $1 million) in minutes highlighting the popularity of the pixelated collectibles.
- Twitter user DeGenData claimed "Punk Sellers are racing to pull their punks off the market" after the announcement by Christie's because offers for the Punks are "getting hit like crazy."
- The "price floor has moved to around 5 ETH ⦠already," tweeted DeGenData.
See also: NFT Frenzy Shows Signs of Cooling but Donât Call It a Market Crash
