Coinbase has refused to create a trilogy on its most popular NFT collection. What does this mean?

December 5, 2022 by cryptobreak

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Earlier this year, when the NFT collection Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) was at its peak, cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase announced the release of a trilogy of short films based on the “monkeys on blockchain” motif. The first part was released in July, but Coinbase has now announced that the release of the remaining two parts of the trilogy will be indefinitely postponed for the time being. And all this is happening against the backdrop of a general decline in the crypto market and waning interest in the unique token sphere. We have a more in-depth look at the situation.

We clarified the latest data: today Bored Ape Yacht Club is the most popular and expensive NFT collection. The minimum price of its representative is 67.59 ETH or the equivalent of 86 thousand dollars.

Ranking of the most popular and expensive NFT-tokens

What’s happening with popular NFTs

Here’s what a Coinbase speaker said in a recent interview with Decrypt.

We are constantly evolving our content strategy and have decided to pause production on our remaining two films while we determine the best way to develop our creative. We will continue to focus on more pressing creative endeavours.

BAYC tokens

A spokesperson for the exchange would not give a reason for the suspension of work on the remaining short films. That said, it can be assumed here that demand for anything around the topic of unique tokens has fallen markedly.

Overall, however, NFTs are still generating serious volumes. For example, in the last month the volume of transactions of the mentioned Bored Ape Yacht Club collection amounted to 61.7 million dollars, which is the best result among the competitors. At the same time, Mutant Ape Yacht Club, the runner-up, is more than twice as far behind.

Trading volumes of NFT tokens in the last month

The trilogy itself, titled The Degen Trilogy, was also heavily promoted by development studio Yuga Labs, which created the NFT collection. Various monkey characters appear in the short films, becoming the faces of some of the series’ most expensive unique tokens. Best of all, the owners of these tokens have been promised a fee of $10,000 in Bitcoin or ApeCoin by Yuga Labs management.

The first part of The Degen Trilogy was released in July on YouTube and the social media pages of both Coinbase and Yuga Labs. The five-minute animated short introduced viewers to human characters on a hunt for ApeCoin in a skyscraper filled with “money zombies”. From time to time, the very monkeys with the NFT tokens appeared in the frame.

The video was heavily criticised by the crypto community, with commentators on social media condemning the confusing plot, long credits and lack of memorable moments. Some also considered the timing of the release of the first part of the trilogy bad, as it was launched after Coinbase laid off some 1,100 employees in June.

Well after FTX’s bankruptcy, crypto fans managed to make many memes referring to “bored monkeys”. According to digital asset enthusiasts, the collapse of the exchange could well be the second part of The Degen Trilogy.

Meme about FTX

Aside from the layoffs at Coinbase, the environment in crypto has changed significantly between the beginning of this year and mid-summer. Back in 2021, NFT as an area of the crypto market was flourishing, with unique tokens becoming a major bullrun trend. Then the investor shock came: first from the collapse of Terra, then the bankruptcy of numerous cryptocurrency companies, followed by the industry being surprised by the collapse of one of the largest exchanges, FTX, in November.

According to analysts at The Block, unique token transactions totalled $643 million in November. By comparison, the same figure exceeded the $5 billion mark in January.

NFT token transaction volumes

Coinbase’s own unique token trading platform statistics show the situation more clearly. Since its launch in April, it has generated just $7 million in revenue for the exchange.

Bored Ape Yacht Club is one of the few NFT collections that has managed to maintain its brand value. Although there have been several scandals associated with the collection itself in the past. The trilogy of short films, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to be the most successful marketing move on Coinbase’s part.

Be that as it may, the subject of NFT continues to be a hot topic for various manufacturers. The latest new initiative to tie in with the Bored Ape Yacht Club collection was announced by Timex, the watchmaker.

They have decided to launch 500 customised pairs of watches together with the BAYC community. The idea is to display a unique NFT on the dial, and this can be exclusively Bored Ape Yacht Club or Mutant Ape Yacht Club.

TIMEX and Bored Ape Yacht Club collaboration

Minting the appropriate NFT to get the watch cost participants 2 ETH, which is the equivalent of $2,500-2,600.

TIMEX and Bored Ape Yacht Club Collaboration

We believe that the current dip in interest in digital assets and related topics is quite logical in today's market environment. Still, it is difficult to make money from crypto right now, so newcomers prefer not to get involved with coins. Obviously, the trend will change after the next bull run begins. At least that's the way things have been going in the past.

Look for even more interesting things in our millionaires cryptochat. There we will discuss other important developments related to the world of decentralisation and blockchain.