Reddit Makes PFP NFTs Cool Again, Marketplace Trading Volume Surges

Social platform Reddit has been silently rolling out new features and onboarding millions of new users to Web3 — 2.8 million to be exact, according to data provided by Polygon and Dune Analytics.

And it’s all thanks to digital collectibles or profile pictures (PFPs).

The buzz around Reddit’s NFT avatars and growing marketplace has been attracting the attention of non-native Web3 users over the past few days.

The numbers speak for themselves. 

Nearly 3 million new wallets have been opened since the RedditFloor marketplace launched and dropped its own avatars in July. Users have minted more than 86,000 NFTs.

On Sunday, daily volume surged from below $1 million to $2 million in less than 24 hours. At the time of publication, the 24-hour sales volume was about $2.6 million.  

Reddit NFTs collectively have a $122 million market cap, according to the marketplace.

For comparison, OpenSea, the largest secondary NFT marketplace, has 2.3 million users. Magic Eden, the top Solana marketplace, has 1.2 million, and LooksRare has around 107,000 users, according to DappRadar data. 

The collectibles are minted on the Polygon proof-of-stake blockchain, which is compatible with the Ethereum virtual machine. Their success has resulted in a huge surge in NFT volume on OpenSea on Polygon over the last couple of days.

The director of research at Proof Collective, known as punk9059, found that Reddit avatars recorded as much trading volume on Oct. 24 — around 1,900 ether (ETH) — as all the ETH NFT volume on Blur, LooksRare, x2y2, LarvaLabs and SudoSwap marketplaces combined.

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This amount of ETH is comparable to 1,901 ETH ($2.5 million) sales of Azuki NFTs representing gold-plated skateboards over the same weekend.

RedditFloor is different

A few things set this marketplace apart from others, such as its native integration. Reddit’s marketplace allows users to create wallets and mint and customize NFTs directly in-app. 

Notably, mentions of crypto lingo are scant on the site, not even the term NFT. Reddit instead sold NFTs as digital collectibles or collectible avatars. Users can display them as profile pictures when users create content on the popular social media platform.

Additionally, “coins” replace tokens and “vaults” refer to wallets. Users can pay for NFTs with credit or debit cards and store their assets in Reddit’s Vault wallet. The checkout process is simple and “looks like you’re buying a video game avatar,” according to Twitter user threadoor.eth.

This has likely attracted non-crypto-native users who don’t realize they are using blockchain technology, or who may have been deterred by complicated crypto language in the past.

While most NFT collections tend to have a 10,000 unit cap, Reddit features around 40,000 limited-edition NFTs designed by Reddit artists. 

While digital collectibles are just one use case for NFTs, Redditors are proving that PFP NFTs are still relevant and coveted. 

Those that choose to make use of their avatars in their profile signal a certain status as Collectible Avatar owners.

The ability to mix and match traits and customize avatars, with a focus on rarity, may incentivize people to hold multiple NFTs at once.

The highest amount paid for a Reddit NFT is $14,817, while the cheapest NFT is currently going for $29. 

Reddit’s initial foray into NFTs went down in June 2021 with the drop of its first NFT collection, CryptoSnoo, based on the platform’s logo Snoo. This latest initiative leverages its existing base of 52 million daily active users and appears to be targeting a more mainstream audience.

Reddit’s co-founder Alexis Ohanian is a vocal proponent of blockchain and crypto and most recently started fundraising for his digital assets-focused venture capital firm Seven Seven Six. Its new fund, dubbed Kryptos, plans to invest $177.6 million into early-stage Web3 startups and cryptocurrency tokens.

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