Finzer says the site is working on an automated way to spot fakes and has moderators who investigate suspicious offerings. For example, a scammer can copy an image of someone else’s art and sell it as an NFT on OpenSea.

OpenSea’s open-market approach heightens the risk of counterfeits, scams and fraud-just ask Amazon or eBay. He’s not the only celebrity who owns an ape-Jimmy Fallon and Mark Cuban have their own simians.

‎‎‎Stephen Curry bought this Bored Ape (#7990) NFT in August for $180,000. Within weeks, Coinbase had 2.5 million sign-ups for its waiting list, and CEO Brian Armstrong was predicting the new business “could be as big or bigger” than its core crypto trading business. In October, Coinbase, the nation’s largest crypto exchange and an original investor in OpenSea, announced it will launch its own NFT peer-to-peer marketplace. “I’ve always had a pretty gray view of the future,” he says.ĭespite its sudden success, OpenSea faces big and varied risks-from fraud and another NFT market bust to new competition. Ultimately, Finzer sees the NFT ownership verification model working for anything from concert tickets to real estate-he’s just not sure what will succeed when. Artists can reserve a percentage of each resale price. Sellers can opt for a fixed-price or auction format. The platform tracks NFTs on ethereum and other blockchains, and all purchases are made in crypto. But they opted to build a category-agnostic platform because they didn’t think they were prescient enough to predict which NFT types would catch on.īeyond casting a wide net, Finzer says, OpenSea has thrived simply by “being in the right place at the right time” and listening to users about what they want.

Some advisors had urged them to specialize in an NFT niche-say, art, gaming or music. You might say humility was at the heart of Finzer and Atallah’s successful strategy.

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