When we thought the dust had settled from Blur and OpenSea’s battle for buyers, OpenSea, the largest non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace, has re-ignited the war by releasing their own “pro” trading tools this week.
Technically more of a rebranding than a new product, OpenSea has repackaged their trading tools that existed under the name Gem, and rebranded them as an elite suite for all traders.
Now using the name OpenSea Pro, the king of marketplaces is giving traders over 170 listings all in one spot, floor-sweeping tools, inventory management options, collection and trait offers, and quite a bit more.
It’s a package that has been long overdue, and with these new tools, OpenSea hopes to stymie the bleeding out of their user base that had been flowing over to Blur.
New tools are great, but what’s in it for traders?
They’re not getting rewards like the BLUR token delivered to traders on the Blur marketplace. OpenSea is looking to reward traders with a different type of token, beginning with an NFT that is free to claim for previous Gem users. The first reward, Gemesis, is a limited edition NFT to celebrate OpenSea’s new milestone moment.
For now, we can only speculate on what future OpenSea NFTs will be, but I’m hoping for good old-fashioned art rewards, and maybe some exclusive tokens that will give on-site access to tools or early access to mint. The sky is the limit when it comes to creative utility that can be given through NFTs. At times CryptoSlam offers a SkyBox NFT that allows the holder advertising space at the top of the leaderboard. Let’s see if OpenSea took notice.
OpenSea Pro’s impact on the market so far has been a nonfactor, with the two days since its launch being some of the slowest days of trading we’ve seen this year. The Forkast 500 NFT Index reflects this cooling off, showing the market down 1.22% since OpenSea Pro’s release.
Multiple marketplaces now offer tools that allow faster, more precise, and bulk trades. This is putting us on a path for a new phase of NFTs. As NFTs continue to lose value, most will eventually reach a low enough price that traders can trade NFTs like crypto. With an unlimited supply of NFTs, and without the “penalty” of platform fees, I expect NFTs to be traded at high volume, with traders looking for tiny percent gains.
This is more likely to happen on Layer 2 blockchains where gas fees are cheaper, but it seems like a natural progression for day trading NFTs. While markets are hard to predict, traders are not. If there’s profit to be made, you can bet that traders will find that profit.
There’s plenty to celebrate in the NFT space still, including 0% platform fees returning to OpenSea, new NFTs from Yuga Labs, Bitcoin Stamps, incredible art being created on the blockchain and, of course, NFT NYC next week.
CryptoSlam and Forkast.News will be at NFT NYC from April 12 to 14 and we have some exciting news to announce there. We’re always excited to meet the Slamfam, so if you’ll be attending stop by and say hello!
