Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) non-fungible tokens are rising again, fueling hopes of a broader recovery in the struggling NFT market as speculative appetite returns to the crypto space.
Price floors, or the lowest value of Yuga Labs’ flagship collection, have risen from around 5 ETH to 10 ETH over the past month, while apecoin (APE), the ecosystem’s governance token, has also risen from below $0.10 to around $0.16 with a sharp increase in trading volumes.
The rebound comes as memecoins and other high-risk crypto assets outperform more defensive sectors such as decentralized finance (DeFi), suggesting that retail traders may be returning to the market after months of subdued activity.
For Michael Figge, the new CEO of Yuga Labs, the rally reflects more than short-term hype.
“It’s clear from the numbers that for a while, when it comes to blue-chip digital collectibles, they’ve been oversold,” Figge told CoinDesk in an interview. “You had this huge squeeze in price, but if you actually look at an overlay chart, single holders were actually up.”
Figge, who has served in various leadership roles at Yuga Labs since 2022, before taking over as CEO last month, argued that NFT prices had become disconnected from user participation during the prolonged downturn.
“A cynic will say that prices have doubled and the number of unique holders has not doubled,” he said. “But it’s really just a recovery after a period where things fell disproportionately.”
Survival beyond the hype
The rebound also comes with a broader revaluation of digital art and on-chain ownership beyond short-term price speculation. In an essay last week, pseudonymous collector and NFT market analyst “Van” argued that while the speculative craze surrounding NFTs largely fizzled out after 2021, institutional adoption of blockchain-based art continued quietly in the background. “Speculation is dead, but the medium has survived,” the essay says, highlighting acquisitions and exhibitions from institutions such as MoMA, the Center Pompidou, and LACMA over the past four years.
This rise has coincided with renewed momentum in the speculative corners of the crypto market. CoinDesk’s MemeCoin Select Index was among the best-performing digital asset sectors last week, outperforming DeFi tokens as traders returned to higher beta bets.
Some market participants also point to growing stress in DeFi as another possible driver of the NFT demand surge. A series of recent exploits and falling yields on lending protocols have shaken confidence in the sector.
“With just one well-planned hack, you can lose everything,” Figge said. “This needs to be solved in DeFi, but it’s definitely made people rethink the idea that this is the only use case. NFTs offer something different: they’re tied to communities that persist beyond just price action.”
Signs of renewed activity are also appearing in NFT financial markets. Earlier last week, a $2.8 million NFT-backed loan tied to a CryptoPunk circulated widely on social media, with the lender expected to earn around $138,000 in interest over 90 days in what traders described as one of the largest NFT-backed loans to date.
The broader NFT rebound has extended beyond BAYC. Pudgy Penguins, another major collectible, has also rebounded strongly in recent weeks, while traders speculate that OpenSea – the marketplace synonymous with 2021’s NFT boom – could reignite activity through a long-rumored token launch.
“Back to basics”
Nonetheless, Figge acknowledged that speculation remains at the heart of the market.
“It would be naive to say that financial speculation is not a major driver,” he said. “Whatever happens in this cycle will rhyme with the last, but it will never be exactly the same. »
In the meantime, Yuga Labs has shifted its focus to community-building efforts, including more than 30 in-person meetups around the world in the past month.
“A lot of what made Bored Ape work in the first place – the social layer – hasn’t really been taken care of in recent years,” Figge said. “We’re back to basics.”
