#63 | Shopify Rolls Out NFT Support To 4.4 Million Merchants

Estimated Read Time: 8 minutes

Hey friends,

We’re thrilled to have you back on this edition of Morning NFTea! Today we have some great stories covering the continued growth of the space with Mastercard's NFT accelerator, some bullish market metrics and Shopify rolling out NFTs to its merchants. Let's jump into it!

Mastercard Announces NFT Accelerator For Web3 Music Artists

There's a good chance you have a Mastercard-powered card in your wallet (or on your phone) right now, and it wouldn't be surprising considering there are 1.544 billion Mastercard cards in circulation worldwide. So with the company's scope and power in mind, it's safe to say we have some pretty bullish news through Mastercard's recently announced Artist Accelerator program hosted on Polygon.

This new initiative will help emerging artists, DJs and producers build their brand through Web3 experiences that include minting and utilizing NFTs, engaging with a virtual community, and live performances in the metaverse. The accelerator program also introduces the Mastercard Music Pass, an NFT that gives you access to Web3 Music educational material and resources. The program will kick off in spring, finishing at the end of the year with a live-streamed artist showcase.

On the announcement, the CEO of Polygon Ryan Wyatt said “Web3 has the potential to empower a new type of artist that can grow a fanbase, make a living, and introduce novel mediums for self-expression and connection on their own terms". This really sums up the opportunity that Web3 and NFTs are creating, where aspiring creators now have new means of revenue streams that also facilitate online communities with innovative utility and closer interactions, all while staying in control of the creator.

A legacy brand like Mastercard encouraging innovative technologies like Web3 and tying their reputable brand to NFTs is no doubt a bullish overall sign for the space. Although Mastercard is getting positive publicity for helping these artists, it's also positive publicity for Web3 and NFTs, further helping solidify NFT's use as a tool rather than just a speculative investment.

2023 NFT Sales Off To A Rocket Start

It's been a good start to the year for the NFT space with the first week of January seeing a total overall volume increase of 26%, while OpenSea alone saw a 40% uptick in its NFT volume according to DappRadar. To dive into these metrics further, over 1.2 million NFT transactions occurred with over 400,000 NFT buyers that contributed to the top 5 blockchains having double-digit increases in NFT volume; Ethereum (+26.22%), followed by Solana (+28.8%), Immutable X (+20.83%), Cardano (+35.97%), and BNB (+71.35%).

With pretty positive indicators for NFT uptake from blockchains across the entire board, this success wasn't just pinned down to a single collection or mint. Most of the top collections saw new “investors” hopping on board; as usual, Bored Ape Yacht Club came out on top with a 52.82% increase in sales over the week prior leading up to its announcement regarding its The Trial of Jimmy the Monkey activation/mint. It's not like December was just a very low volume month either, in fact, quite the opposite with the “tax-loss harvesting” surging December sales to the highest since June and a 22% increase over that of November.

We don't usually cover news on the NFT market or the monetary side of Web3 as the space is still extremely volatile and this macro news doesn't represent the long-term growth and momentum of this innovative technology, at least not as much as compared to reporting on how the biggest brands in the world are furthering NFTs mainstream adoption. In saying this, no doubt we have all been hibernating through this crypto winter so it's great to see some positive news to start the year off with. Will this mini bull run last? no one knows, but it's a fair bet that brands and the use-cases of NFT technology won't be slowing down anytime soon, and neither will our coverage of them!

Shopify Enabling NFT capabilities For Its Merchants

Shopify is an absolute online shopping behemoth used by over 4.4 million stores with over 700 million customers mainly facilitated through its platform giving entrepreneurs the ability to easily start an E-commerce website. In a pretty revolutionary move, merchants of Shopify will now not need to direct customers to a particular marketplace to sell NFTs, and instead can directly mint and sell them through their existing Shopify site.

In partnership with the blockchain startup Venly, Shopify is enabling millions of merchants to create eco-friendly digital collectibles for the masses through the Shopify NFT App. If you have a keen eye you may have noticed the term “eco-friendly” dropped — that's because currently, the storefronts will only support the Avalanche blockchain (Immutable X coming soon). Avalanche is an “eco-friendly” Ethereum alternative Layer 1 boasting faster and cheaper transactions with less energy consumption. Creators Ava Labs also promote a variety of socially beneficial projects that support eco-friendly practices that leverage the growth of blockchain technology.

Shopify isn't just enabling merchants to sell NFTs, but has created the necessary infrastructure for Web3 through supporting token-gated experiences and utility, even allowing sellers to connect NFTs to real products as a means of authentication.

As we continue pushing the space towards mainstream adoption, it is stories like this that are some of the most influential, a single platform rolling out a feature that could be viewed in the billions, what an exciting time for NFTs.

Thanks for joining us today, we hope you enjoyed this edition and we will see you in a couple of days with the next round-up, but until then have an awesome few days, take care!

What's the NFTea?

Let's talk about 'Checks' — an NFT project that has captured the attention of the entire market (and received a write-up from Erika Lee at One37PM).

'Checks' was an open edition mint by Jack Butcher that minted at $8, the same price that Twitter Blue launched at.

After minting, Jack integrated a game theory burn mechanism into the collection: burn the edition and receive an on-chain original. Then burn that for an even smaller edition original.

The genius part of the idea? It not only reduces the supply of the original open edition mint, but also creates new, scarcer artwork to reward participants.

The market obviously likes what Jack has created, with 400 ETH in total volume and sitting at a floor price of 0.086 ETH ($120) — 15x the original mint price!

We can't wait to see what comes next in this project.

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DISCLAIMER:

None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.