Monthly NFT sales fall below $400M, marking yearly low

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) sales recorded a $374 million monthly volume in August, continuing a downward trend and recording its lowest monthly sales in 2024. This marks the first time digital collectibles recorded a volume below $400 million this year. 

Data from NFT tracker CryptoSlam shows that digital collectibles only had monthly sales of $374 million in August 2024. Unlike its highest monthly record in 2024, which was $1.6 billion in March, NFTs’ current monthly volume represents a 76% drop. 

NFT monthly sales volume continues to drop

NFTs had a strong quarter at the start of 2024, with a total sales volume of $4.1 billion. However, digital collectibles could not keep the momentum going, as the volume dropped to $2.24 billion in the second quarter of 2024. This represents a 45% quarter-on-quarter decline. 

Despite a surge in weekly sales in the last week of August, NFTs have been unable to break the constant decline that started in April when sales dropped to $1.2 billion. This was followed by an even steeper drop when NFTs’ monthly volumes hit $598 million in May.  

In July, NFTs recorded a volume of $427 million. However, despite a lower turnout in monthly sales volumes, July showed an 87% increase in NFT transactions. Data showed that NFT transactions increased from 5.7 million in June to 10.7 million in July. 

In August, NFTs had 7.3 million total transactions, representing a 31% drop. However, the average NFT sale’s value increased by 27%, jumping from $39.93 to $50.74. Two days into September, NFT average sales increased to $86.04 per transaction.

Related: NFTs can be securities but SEC Wells notice to OpenSea ‘not productive’ — Lawyer 

Speculative capital moving from NFTs into memecoins

In a previous Cointelegraph statement, Solo Ceesay, co-founder and CEO of social wallet Calaxy said that speculative capital has flowed into memecoins this cycle. The executive believes that the space is moving on from NFTs into memecoins. 

On Aug. 19, the once most expensive CryptoPunk was quietly transferred into a different wallet. Ceesay believes that the previous owner of the blue-chip NFT wanted to transfer the capital into memecoins. 

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