Yuga Labs raises $310M in NFT sales as Ethereum gas fee surges

LAGOS (CoinChapter.com) — Yuga Labs, the company behind the leading nonfungible token series, Bored Ape, has raised around $310 million from the sale of its highly anticipated Otherside metaverse land.

In detail, Yuga Labs at the weekend began the sale of “Otherdeeds” NFTs which it pointed out would provide holders with access to plots of virtual land in its metaverse (Otherside).

The Otherdeed NFT mint is sold out – we are awestruck at the demand shown tonight. Apes and Mutants, the opening of the 21-day claim period is being delayed until the price of gas drops to reasonable levels. We’ll tweet when the claim opens. https://t.co/iRz64lklbv

— OthersideMeta (@OthersideMeta) May 1, 2022

Otherdeeds collection which sold out in hours racked in more than $310 million as users rushed to purchase the assets. Notably, there were 55,000 Otherdeeds for sale, and each was priced at 305 ApeCoin.

Accordingly, the NFT cost about $5,800 given Apecoin’s price which traded under $20 at the time of the mint. Also, Yuga Labs had earlier revealed that Otherdeeds could only be bought using ApeCoin which was launched in March.

The impressive sales pushed Otherdeed NFTs to the top of OpeanSea marketplace’s most purchased assets. Similarly, data from CryptoSlam, indicated that Otherdeed already recorded over $242 million in total secondary volume traded.

Additionally, Yuga Labs disclosed that the funds earned from the NFT sales would be locked up for one year. It said:

“And before anyone asks: Whatever ApeCoin is earned from this auction will be locked up for one year. That means no voting with it in the ApeCoin DAO either.”

Yuga Labs NFT Sales Crashes Etherscan

Although Yuga Labs’ sale revealed that there’s still a high demand for crypto assets, it however, led to Etherscan crash. The high demand led to traffic on Etherscan which reportedly led to the outage of the protocol for several hours.

In addition to knocking out Etherscan, Otherdeeds rush also led to a significant rise in Ethereum gas prices. While some users processed their transactions for a lower price in gas fees, others reportedly paid over $4,000 for a single transaction.

Etherscan data indicated that several users paid between 2.6 ETH ($6500) to 5 ETH ($14000) as gas fees. Similarly, several users also experienced failed transactions due to enormous transactions. Notably, the event has led to major condemnation of the new NFT project.

Meanwhile, BAYC co-founder Garga.eth has since apologized for the chaotic event describing it as a sour moment for the NFT community. He said:

“Needless to say tonight didn’t go how anyone wanted it to. I want to say sorry to the apes, and to everyone else who eagerly looked to join into the project. It’s especially a sour moment since Otherside has been a passion project for so long.”

Additionally, Yuga Labs has promised to reimburse users who lost their ETH holdings in gas due to failed transactions.

We are still working on refunding all Otherdeed minters with failed transactions their gas. Note that you do not need to do anything – we will transfer it all back to your wallet and announce when it is completed. Don't click any links.

— Yuga Labs (@yugalabs) May 2, 2022

It is worth knowing that BAYC or Mutant Ape NFTs holders will be able to claim Otherdeed over three weeks. This would enable them to skip the rush and avoid the high gas fees.

Apecoin (APE) Plunges In Aftermath Of NFT Sales

ApeCoin’s token price has slumped significantly in the aftermath of the sale. According to data from CoinGecko, APE on the day has dropped by over 15% and is trading at $14.4.

APE market cap has also declined from more than $7.4 billion on April 28 to $4 billion on the day. Currently, the token has a 24-hours trading volume of $2.6 billion and a circulating supply of 280 million APE coins.

Additionally, Otherdeeds NFTs were trading on OpenSea at a floor price of 4.25 ETH at the time of publication.