‘Bored Ape’ NFT-startup Yuga Labs valued at $4 billion after funding
(Reuters) – Yuga Labs, the corporate behind the “Bored Ape Yacht Membership” assortment of NFTs, mentioned on Tuesday it was valued at $4 billion after a $450 million funding spherical led by a16z crypto, Andreessen Horowitz’s crypto fund.
Metaverse gaming firm Animoca and its subsidiary, The Sandbox, and crypto change FTX have been additionally among the many traders that participated within the newest spherical.
The hype round digital property that propelled crytocurrencies like bitcoin to document costs final 12 months, has additionally spilled over into nonfungible tokens, or NFTs.
An NFT is a digital asset that makes use of blockchain expertise to document who owns a digital object akin to a picture, video or in-game merchandise. Bored Apes NFTs are sometimes used as profile footage on social media.
Gross sales of NFTs reached $25 billion in 2021, in comparison with simply $94.9 million the 12 months earlier than, knowledge from market tracker DappRadar exhibits.
Nonetheless, whilst NFTs entice followers together with former U.S. first girl Melania Trump and Jamaican dash nice Usain Bolt, some have questioned why a lot cash is spent on gadgets that don’t bodily exist.
(Reporting by Niket Nishant in Bengaluru; Modifying by Shailesh Kuber)
