Terra NFT Market Sees Trading Spike Amid UST Collapse

Terra’s NFT daily trading volume on Wednesday reached 3.1 million UST, up from 384,769 UST the day before

article-image

Blockworks exclusive art by Axel Rangel

share

key takeaways

  • After never surpassing 11,000 LUNA, volume on Random Earth skyrocketed to 438,665 LUNA
  • Investors are torn between loyalty to LUNA and a loss of confidence

Though Ethereum is home to some of the most dominant NFTs, at least a dozen other blockchains mint the digital collectibles — including Terra, which collectors have turned to thanks to comparably lower gas fees. 

Amid the collapse of Terra’s stablecoin TerraUSD (UST) and its sister token, LUNA, NFT (non-fungible token) projects built on Terra have seen a considerable uptick in trading as savvy traders look to cash in on deep price discrepancies. 

The daily volume of NFT trading on popular Terra marketplaces Random Earth, Knowhere and Luart is the highest it’s been since March 1, according to data aggregator Flipside Crypto. Terra’s NFT daily volume on May 11 reached 3.1 million UST ($2.1 million), up from 384,769 UST the day before. 

Random Earth and Knowhere also observed their highest days of trading volume on May 11. After never surpassing 11,000 LUNA, volume on Random Earth skyrocketed to 438,665 LUNA ($485,263), while Knowhere reached 6,005 LUNA at the time of publication.

Some of the most highly traded Terra NFT collections include Galactic Punks, Hell Cats, Derby Stars and Luna Bulls. Twitter user @RyanBethencourt pointed out the rapid repricing of NFTs, specifically on Random Earth, and questioned if their value would hold if Terra were to “fall into a death spiral.”

Loading Tweet..

Users of another Terra NFT marketplace, OnePlanet, took to Discord to report transaction delays — traders said the digital assets didn’t immediately show up in their wallets after the purchase closed. 

And those who couldn’t delist their NFTs in time were promised an investigation by Discord moderators.

A sweep through crypto Twitter showed mixed sentiment among investors. User @PostmanNay claimed, “All nfts on terra are now as worthless as the luna token.” 

Another user, @c4chaos, called for compassion for those may have lost their life savings.

Terra NFT collection PolyEgg asked Twitter followers which blockchain to move to, because “it’s not a good idea to continue minting” on Terra. While Solana was a popular pick, seasoned LUNA investors, known as “LUNAtics,” continue to scoop up Terra NFTs. 

Loading Tweet..

Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

Tags

Decoding crypto and the markets. Daily, with Byron Gilliam.

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

recent research

Unlocked by Template (10).png

Research

Innovations on Aptos’ technical design through Raptr, Shardines, and Zaptos approach near-optimal latency and throughput by unlocking 100% utilization of network resources, with the capacity to settle 260k transactions per second with latencies less than 800ms. The original Move language was revamped with the launch of Move 2, supporting more expressivity in smart contract logic and a scalable ability to interact with high volume datasets. The ecosystem has benefitted from strong asset inflows, now hosting over $1.3B in stablecoins, $450M in bridged BTC, and $530M in RWAs. Activity in the Aptos ecosystem has grown notably over the past year, with monthly application revenue reaching ~$835k and monthly DEX volumes growing to over $5B, both at new all time highs.

article-image

Asset allocator says fee compression could be a challenge as Grayscale converts more crypto funds to ETFs

article-image

The Stripe-acquired firm has big plans for a streamlined, multi-wallet future

article-image

Both founders of the former crypto lender have now landed in new crypto industry roles

article-image

Bitcoin’s recent peak is a victory lap for curvers left and right

article-image

Securitize CEO Carlos Domingo says institutions are eager to get exposure to tokenization