Non-fungible token (NFT) sales continued their downward trajectory in September as digital collectibles’ monthly sales volumes failed to recover.
Data from CryptoSlam shows that NFTs recorded $296 million in sales during September — a 20% decrease from August’s sales volume of $373 million. The figure is an 81% drop from the $1.6 billion in sales volume recorded in March, digital collectibles’ strongest month in 2024.
Highest monthly sales and lowest monthly sales in 2024. Source: CryptoSlam
Digital collectibles have not seen a monthly sales volume below $300 million since January 2021, when the monthly sales volume fell to $109 million.
Apart from sales volume, total NFT transactions dropped 32% from 7.3 million in August to 4.9 million in September.
Despite the many negative statistics in the NFT space for September, the average value of NFT transactions increased by 18% from $50.71 in August to $60 in September.
Related: NFTs can be securities but SEC Wells notice to OpenSea ‘not productive’ — Lawyer
United States regulator eyes NFTs
The downward trend within the NFTs space comes as the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sets its sights on NFTs.
On Aug. 28, Devin Finzer, CEO of NFT marketplace OpenSea, reported that the company received a Wells notice from the securities regulator. Finzer claimed that the SEC alleged tint NFTs on the platform may qualify as unregistered securities.
On Sept. 16, the SEC fined the NFT-themed restaurant Flyfish Club $750,000 for selling NFTs. SEC commissioners Hester Peirce and Mark Uyeda criticized the enforcement action from their agency, arguing that the NFTs sold by Flyfish should not trigger securities laws. The commissioners said these NFTs were only “a different way to sell memberships.”
Despite the SEC’s NFT crackdown, Luca Schnetzler, the CEO of the popular NFT collection Pudgy Penguins, dismissed the regulator’s actions as “nonsense.”
In a previous interview with Cointelegraph, Schnetzler described the SEC’s actions as a “nothing burger,” arguing that going after OpenSea means the agency must also go against larger organizations that dived into NFTs. This includes Sotheby’s, Nike and Pokemon.
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