Ever since my last foray into PFP NFTs, I've been diving deeper into the world of collectible NFTs (and flipping) and want to share with everyone how I started, how it's going, and what I feel about the whole situation. The collectible NFT market is largely considered to be scammy and full of unfulfilled promises, but the combination of art and community props up the market in mysterious ways that I still am figuring out. Let's dive right in!
How I Started
I started my foray into the degen NFT flipping community with two collections, CartoonsNFT and the sunnies collection, and bought a total of 7 NFTs for 0.4585 ETH.
| Collection | Number of NFTs | Total Price Paid (excl. Gas) |
|---|---|---|
| Cartoons | 4 | 0.2485 ETH |
| Sunnies | 3 | 0.21 ETH |
| Total | 7 | 0.4585 ETH |
Cartoons - Success!
I lurked in both the Cartoons and Sunnies Discords daily and noticed some big differences in the communities. The Cartoons Discord community was a lot more focused on the price floor, delist parties, and other things that were directly related to the value of the collection. On the other hand, the Sunnies Discord was a lot more chill and even had a prominent member of the community giving out over 50 sunnies over a period of time to many people.
Many "NFT experts" usually consider excessive "floor talk" (discussion about the floor value of a collection) to be a red flag, because it means that the community is full of flippers and bears no resemblance to rock-solid communities like BAYC, Azuki, alien frens, etc.
Well, it came as a surprise that the collection that pumped for me was the Cartoons collection. Even though the price of my NFTs dropped momentarily for a few days, it was to my luck that rumors of Gary Vee, a prolific personality in the NFT space, could potentially be collaborating with Cartoons. Sales popped, and there were hundreds of sales each hour - everyone in the Discord was going wild! The price floor rose from 0.05 ETH to 0.18 ETH. People asked whether they should delist their OpenSea listings since it was such a sure thing that the Cartoons collection would be on the moon. And each time, these questions were met with a resounding no.
I knew that this artificial pump wouldn't last, since it was only a rumor. And even though the atmosphere in the Discord was euphoric, I tried not to let it cloud my judgment and sold all of my Cartoons for a decent profit. It turns out that I did well - three weeks after the rumors, the Cartoons floor price is now at a rather depressing 0.03 ETH.
Profit after selling (excluding Gas, including 7.5% Sales tax): 0.668 - 0.249 = 0.419 ETH
Not too shabby!
Sunnies - Broke Even
Source: sunniesnft Homepage
Although the Sunnies had a more chill and welcoming community as compared to the Cartoons community, it did feel like it was a little slow on the development front. There were events like Poker nights and photography contests, but it just felt like it didn't really gain much traction outside the little Sunnies bubble. And besides, new NFT launches were happening every day - how could it keep up?
After seeing sunnies not go anywhere for a bit, I decided to let my collections go for a very small profit. Perhaps it was the right choice because the project started to have issues with its leader and community shortly after I sold. The community was pretty chill and nice, but I wasn't an active community member anyway and didn't see the community growing much bigger in the near term. From time to time, I have to remind myself that I'm a dirty NFT flipper and I shouldn't get too attached to my buys.
Profit after selling (excluding Gas, including 8.5% Sales tax): 0.272 - 0.21 = 0.062 ETH
Minimal profit, but at least I got out with a profit rather than with a loss.
Loser Club - Currently Holding
Source: Loser Club homepage
With my profits from flipping Cartoons, I looked for my next target to flip. One of the collections that I had my eye on was Loser Club. Even before I joined their Discord, I looked at the art and was extremely impressed. It had a very coherent style and was different from the hundreds of other apes/punks/mfers derivatives out there. In my mind, it checked the boxes for being a potential winner in the NFT space:
- It had a recognizable and distinct art style that wasn't anywhere else in the NFT world yet.
- The artist is a cornerstone of the project
- The art had hype "vibes" that seemed to have the potential to blow up in the correct situations
Source: Loser Club homepage
I bought 3 immediately.
My tweet: https://twitter.com/_kephler/status/1502939355069173760
I bought them for a total of 0.672 ETH.
Over the next few days, it turned out that Loser Club got tons of attention within the NFT sphere and the floor price shot up from ~0.2 ETH when I bought to a high of almost 0.7 ETH. I was so bullish on the art and the potential for this project that this time, I didn't hit the sell button immediately. From the standpoint of an NFT flipper, it wasn't the best move to not take some profits off the table - I could have sold one to recover about 90% of my total cost basis.
Alas, I didn't, and the floor price currently languishes at the 0.23 ETH mark. While I'm a little bummed that I didn't sell the pump (Protip: Selling a pump in a bear market is almost never wrong), I still have high hopes for Loser Club in the future and still hold on to two of them. I sold one at 0.279 ETH to explore another promising project that I bought into, but I'll write about it in another post.
Conclusion
From my initial investment of 0.48 ETH, I'm still up by quite a bit and am quite happy with my progress so far. Since this money is considered to be "fun money" for me (i.e. I'm not relying on turning a profit for my daily expenses), I think I'm pretty satisfied with how things are going, although I'm also becoming more aware of the potential dangers of a rather illiquid market like the NFT market. I hope you enjoyed this post, and see you in the next one!