NFT Marketplaces

While many keen, experienced investors are still trying to get their heads around cryptocurrency as an investment opportunity, the savvy among us have already moved on the next money making phenomenon, NFTs. NFT stands for non-fungible token, a unit of data which is used to guarantee originality and authenticity of a digital item such as art, video games and files containing music or videos. NFTs represent something that is unique, irreplaceable and irreplicable like a 1-of-1 original piece of art, or a handcrafted statue made by a famous sculptor. 

It’s becoming harder and harder to ignore NFTs as there is a seemingly endless stream of front-page stories about large transactions coming out daily. An NFT artwork by a digital artist was recently sold for nearly $70 million, and it’s not the only one. Some investors are even staking their claim for a slice of the pie by gambling on investments into companies that they believe are best placed to make large NFT deals in the future. For example, Chinese online art platform, Takung art saw its share price rise by a whopping 712% in just four days in March this year.

NFTs are sold on marketplace websites which use similar blockchain technology to cryptocurrencies. Great sites like Cryptowisser provide comprehensive comparison lists which evaluate key aspects of NFT marketplaces such as blockchain used, commissions charged and payment methods. Cryptowisser is great for those willing to take the time to extensively research market places before diving into the NFT market, but for those who aren’t, here’s a list of 3 of the most promising marketplaces around today.

 

Async Art

Many industry experts are describing Async Art as a blockchain art revolution. This marketplace allows users to create, buy, sell and collect digital art. Async Art’s unique selling points are it’s two tier purchase system and it’s collaborative ownership ethos. Users can purchase art in one of two forms, “Masters” which are simple original 1 of 1 pieces of art, and “Layers” which are smaller pieces of art which when combined create the Master image. While Masters embody the very spirit of NFTs, Layers are unique in that users can edit them, which then causes the Master image to be altered. For example, if the Master was an image of a house with a dark, cloudy sky in the background, and someone bought the sky as a Layer and removed some clouds or made the sky brighter, the Master image would then show this change. The success of this concept is in the idea of being a small part of something bigger and it’s working too, since February 2020 the site has made over $1.5 million in sales.
 

Portion

Portion allows both artists and investors to connect via blockchain technology. Users can buy and sell digital art amongst the Artist Community, a worldwide collection of creators. Portion allows anyone to manage both their physical and digital art all in one place, offering full transparency. Portion distributes tokens to artists which allow users to govern the platform, as well as have a say in it’s future. Portion tokens are ERC-20 assets on the Ethereum Blockchain and are also released for artist grants and partnerships. Portion also has its own cryptocurrency (PRT) and tokens are valued at 500 PRT each.

 

SuperRare

SuperRare is a marketplace which, as its name suggests, is heavily geared towards allowing users to buy, sell and collect 1 of 1, unique pieces of digital art. Each piece is created by one of the artists in their network and converted into an NFT that users can possess and trade. All art on SuperRare can be purchased using ether (ETH), which makes for smooth transactions as it ETH, of course, uses the Ethereum blockchain network. The small quantity of artists featured on SuperRare adds to the uniqueness of its artwork, although this will soon not be the case, as the number grows monthly.

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