NFT Sales, Search Interest Drop Sharply In 2022

Sales of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have plummeted by about 80 percent over the past year, according to industry data, amidst a broader slump in the value of cryptocurrencies and a number of high-profile bankruptcies in the crypto world.

NFTs are a unique certificate of ownership stored on a blockchain, the technology used to process cryptocurrency transactions.

They have been used to sell ownership of digital artworks, Twitter posts, computer code and virtual property, and former president Donald Trump earlier this month raised about $4.5 million (£3.7m) by selling a collection of NFT trading cards.

A temple in Taiwan has even reportedly issued the tokens as a way for people to increase their engagement with an annual pilgrimage.

Crypto slump

Industry data from Cryptoslam.io found that NFT sales reached a peak of about $4.9bn in sales worldwide in January 2022, but have since fallen to only about $565m so far during the month of December.

The figure is roughly 80 percent lower than December 2021, which saw $2.8bn in NFT sales.

Google Trends data found searches for NFT-related information also declined sharply over the period.

The term “NFT” had a score of about 52 during the week of 26 December 2021 to 1 January 2022, falling to about 16 for the week of 18 December to 24 December 2022.

Search trend

The term peaked with a score of 100 for the week of 16 January to 22 January 2022.

The region showing the most search interest in NFTs is currenty mainland China, followed by Hong Kong, Singapore, Nigeria and Taiwan, according to Google.