In 2021, non-fungible token (NFT) trading volume exceeded $13 billion, according to The Block Research. The indicator has grown almost 400 times compared to 2020 ($33 million). 88% of the NFT trading volume (more than $12.5 billion) this year was provided by the OpenSea marketplace.
One of the largest and oldest auction houses in the world, Sotheby’s, which was founded in 1744, raised $ 100 million from the sale of NFT tokens in 2021. At the same time, about 78% of bidders on NFT used Sotheby’s for the first time, and more than half of the participants in such auctions not yet 40 years old.
In 2021, the cryptocurrency industry attracted $30 billion in venture capital investments, which is more than has been invested in all the years of the sector’s existence. Previously, 2018 was considered a record year, for which the cryptoindustry received about $8 billion in investments.