Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT Sells For Record ETH Amount: Big Bet Or Marketing Play?

A Bored Ape Yacht Club non-fungible token sold for a record amount Tuesday despite the sector being in a downward trend for sales volume. Here’s the record and what it could mean.

What Happened: Bored Ape Yacht Club #7537 sold for 1,024 Ethereum ETH/USD on Tuesday, which values the NFT at around $1.14 million.

In Ethereum terms, this marks the largest amount paid for a Bored Ape NFT on leading marketplace OpenSea. The sale beats a previous record of 769 ETH. The price paid was not a record in U.S. dollars, with the price of Ethereum significantly lower than where it was earlier this year.

Bored Ape #7537 has the following traits:

New Punk Blue Background: 12% of Apes

Bandolier Clothes: 2%

Eyes Closed: 7%

Brown Fur: 14%

Police Motorcycle Helmet: 1%

Bored Mouth: 23%

As you can see, the Ape does not have any rare under 1% traits, which led to many questioning the sale price reported Tuesday.

The previous OpenSea record was 769 ETH paid for Ape #2087. This was a rare Bored Ape with the trippy fur traits found in 0.77% of all Bored Apes.

Bored Ape #7537 ranks as the 6793rd rarest Ape according to Rarity Tools.

Related Link: If You Bought A Bored Ape Yacht Club Six Weeks Ago, Here's How Much You've Lost 

Why It’s Important: Many compared the purchase Tuesday to the large 500 ETH sale of a non-rare Bored Ape by musician Justin Bieber.

Tuesday's purchase of the Bored Ape was done by an OpenSea account called btok1024.eth.

Users on Twitter pointed to Btok being a website and social media platform for a company that has previously pumped memecoins.

Btok has over 10 million registered users according to their website, with an app available on all major app store platforms.

Images on the website feature Bored Ape #7537 as part of its branding, suggesting that the Ape was previously held by the company, and they bought it from a new wallet.

Some users on Twitter pointed to a huge marketing stunt by the company with the record amount paid and the 1024 ETH purchase price coinciding with its name Btok1024. Others warned that people should be cautious downloading the app or connecting their wallet to the site to make sure it's safe and this wasn’t a huge million dollar scam.

Price Action: The floor price of Bored Apes is 84 ETH at the time of writing, or around $89,873.

Photo: Courtesy of opensea.io