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- A CryptoPunk was sold for $56 million but the community doesn’t trust the sale
- The sale raised some red flags because the NFT market is currently in a bearish mood
- Some think the sale is a publicity stunt for an upcoming meme coin
A CryptoPunk fetching $56 million in a bearish market has raised red flags on the authenticity of the sale despite OpenSea recording the transaction. Details indicate that Punk #1563 was purchased for 24,000 ETH valued at slightly above $56 million, a price that hasn’t been paid before, even for the rarest collectible in the CryptoPunk collection. Some in the NFT space think that the sale was meant to attract the attention of the crypto community in anticipation of a new memecoin, a marketing tactic that’s rarely used.
The $56 Million Was Borrowed From Balancer
On-chain details about the movement of funds used to purchase the Punk indicate a sinister motive by the collector. The funds were taken as a loan on the DeFi platform Balancer. The same amount of funds, 24,000 ETH, was returned to Balancer after the transaction.
Punk 1563 bought for 24,000 ETH ($56,292,000.00 USD) by 0x9cbb3d from 0xba1349. https://t.co/FqDvGZvg05 #cryptopunks #ethereum pic.twitter.com/hWimHKYb0x
— CryptoPunks Bot (@cryptopunksbot) October 3, 2024
The movement of the funds raised questions on whether the “seller” was also the “buyer.” Moving the funds to and from Balancer cost the individual roughly $56 in transaction fees. Pseudonymous on-chain investigator 0xQuit thinks that the sale is a marketing stunt for “a Kamala Harris Punks memecoin” that’s in the pre-sale stage.
6/ This time, it appears to be an attempt at marketing a Kamala Harris Punks memecoin. Contract B in this case is a newly deployed ERC20 token called Kamala Harris Punk, that has an open presale for ~1 week pic.twitter.com/qEY9COxtOS
— Quit (@0xQuit) October 3, 2024
Not a Record Loan
The loan, however, isn’t the highest taken to purchase a CryptoPunk. Three years ago, an NFT collector, for example, took a loan of $532 million from a DeFi platform to purchase Punk #9998 and repaid the loan after the transaction.
The suspicious CryptoPunk sale comes three weeks after a $1.5 million Punk was bought for $23,000 and a month after a $24 million Punk was sold for an undisclosed amount. It also comes a month after a report revealed that 96% of NFTs are dead.
With Punk #1563 buyer’s intentions uncovered, it’s unlikely that the marketing stunt will attain the desired effect.
