🥛 The Wall Street Journal is Wrong

GM. This is the Milk Road, where we help you untangle the knots of crypto.

We’re also here for moral support every time the Fed raises interest rates. Another half a percentage point - the biggest increase in two decades 🤬

Estimated read time: 3 minutes and 17 seconds

In other news, here’s what we have from cryptoland:

• 🧐 Milk Road Mythbusters: Are NFTS flatlining?

• 🤑 Gary Vee says CryptoPunks are his most confident investment

• 🦍 Did Elon join the Bored Ape Yacht Club?

• 🍪 Bite-sized cookies

MILK ROAD MYTHBUSTERS: ARE NFTS FLATLINING?

Welcome to a new segment we like to call the MilkBusters. This is where we debunk common narratives.

The Wall Street Journal published an article titled "Is this the beginning of the end of NFTs?" saying NFT sales are down 92% since September.

Of course, people jumped on this. Because making fun of NFTs is the easiest thing in the world. It’s the yo mama joke of crypto.

But is the Wall St. Journal right? Are NFT sales down big?

Myth #1: Daily NFT sales are down 92%

The truth: NFT daily volume on OpenSea is hitting near all-time highs. Multiple records have been broken thanks to NFT collections like MoonBirds and the Bored Ape land sale. OpenSea saw $480M in sales volume on May 1st alone.

Here’s a chart of NFT sales per week:

Myth #2: The number of active users has fallen off a cliff

WSJ says that weekly active wallets in the NFT market are down 88% from all-time highs.

The truth: There were over 350,000 active wallets last week. In fact, it’s been that way for 14 of the last 17 weeks.

Myth #3: Markets have gotten crushed and NFTs are some of the riskiest bets

WSJ says that rising interest rates have crushed the crypto market and NFTs are some of the most speculative bets out there.

The truth: NFTs have actually outperformed most crypto bets. According to the Nansen Blue Chip index, the blue chips have returned +33% YTD (in USD).

The Nansen chart above shows performance in terms of ETH

To compare:

• Blue Chip NFTs: +33%

• Bitcoin: -15.8%

• ETH: -20.9%

• S&P 500: -10.8%

• NASDAQ: -18.5%

The verdict: WSJ spilled the milk. They are making big claims but the data doesn’t back it up. In fact, the source they used is just plain wrong.

NFT numbers are looking pretty healthy, however one trend we are seeing is that the money is moving from low and mid-tier projects to the blue chips (the creme da la crop of NFTs)

One problem with crypto is that you have huge tribes:

• NFT Fanboys → will only tell you how great NFTs are

• NFT Haters → will talk your ear off about why NFTs are a scam/waste of money

At the Milk Road, we are not fanboys or haters. We are curious, and just want to know what’s actually going on.

GARY VEE SAYS CRYPTOPUNKS ARE HIS MOST CONFIDENT INVESTMENT

Gary Vee was the latest guest on Logan Paul’s podcast, Impaulsive.

It was 2 hours long but there was something that really got our attention:

The investment Gary Vee is most confident in right now? CryptoPunks. Over a 30-year span, CryptoPunks are the only thing he really feels good about.

He even said that VeeFriends (his own project) would need to execute perfectly to be in the same sentences as the Punks.

Now Gary tells us he owns 60+ Punks (casual flex), so you might be thinking: “well of course he’s gonna say stuff like this.”

Nope, he says he has 60+ Punks because he believes in them so much. Don’t get it twisted.

Check out the full segment on CryptoPunks here.

Milk Road Take: Whew. This is good for us because in case you missed it, we bought a CryptoPunk last month for $200k

ELON CHANGED HIS PICTURE TO A BORED APE, AND PEOPLE WENT APE SHIT

Here’s what happened:

1/ Elon changed his profile picture to this collection of Bored Apes and instead of just picking one, he used a whole banner of em

2/ The price of Apes & Apecoin went way up. +20% in just a few hours.

3/ Then he tweets a joke about it....."I dunno...seems kinda fungible." Uh-oh. Maybe he didn’t buy? Markets start to slow down.

4/ Then he changed his profile picture to a rocket and the prices shot right back down to where they were before he changed his picture.

Elon getting into NFTs is like me cannonballing into a bathtub. It gets messy.

RICK ROSS CALLS OUT CRYPTO INVESTORS

Crypto has had plenty of skeptics over the years - politicians, business people, banks, etc. we call them The Crypto Haterz Club.

The newest member? The rapper Rick “The Boss” Ross. If you don’t know him, Everyday He’s Hustlin’ and he’s one of the richest rappers there is.

He posted this MTV Cribs-style video on Twitter calling out crypto investors to prove they’re actually making the dough they say they are.

In the video, he shows some sneak peeks of his own crib, which btw looks like a royal museum.

Now the real question is who’s gonna show the boss their “metaverse money”?

BITE-SIZED COOKIES (TO GO WITH YOUR GLASS O' MILK)

Johnnie Walker partners up with VeeFriends. A few lucky VeeFriend holders are getting a custom designed, limited edition Johnnie Walker Blue Label bottle and drinking accessories.

An NFT owner got a $3.3M loan by using their CryptoPunks as collateral. 21% interest rate tho…

Gucci will start to accept crypto at some of their stores. Please don’t tell my girl.

NounsDAO has a new esports team. It’s a DOTA team. They are using their treasury in super interesting ways. We might have to get in on the action…

The Pope is dropping NFTs. The Vatican is looking to create an NFT gallery to democratize their art. The holiest of NFTs coming soon.

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DISCLAIMER:

None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.