The non-fungible token (NFT) market experienced a remarkable upswing in February 2023, reaching a total trading volume of over $2 billion, as reported by DappRadar.
This surge marked a 117% increase compared to January and continued into March, with only a slight decrease to just under $2 billion.
Market-wide data from DappRadar and supplementary on-chain information from Dune revealed that the trading volume in March amounted to $1.95 billion, a 4% drop from February’s all-time high of $2.04 billion.
Blur, an Ethereum-based NFT marketplace, was the main contributor to this volume, responsible for nearly $1.35 billion in trades, up from $1.32 billion in February.
Blur’s trading activity experienced a significant boost in mid-February after the introduction of its BLUR reward token, which has enticed large-scale “whale” traders who act as market makers.
The resulting increase in trading volume has led to a corresponding rise in overall NFT market sales, fueling concerns over potential market manipulation or wash trading.
While DappRadar considers Blur‘s trading activity legitimate, data platform CryptoSlam has categorized it as manipulative.
OpenSea, the leading NFT marketplace in terms of total unique wallets, recorded a trading volume decline from $587 million in February to $424 million in March.
Ethereum NFT trading, however, remained relatively stable at $1.82 billion in March, compared to $1.81 billion in February.
Additionally, March saw a slight decrease in the number of NFTs sold, with about 5.8 million NFTs sold compared to nearly 6.5 million in February.
Notably, January outperformed both months with over 6.6 million NFTs sold, despite a lower trading volume.
The NFT market’s February performance was the strongest since May 2022, a period marred by the collapse of Terra’s crypto ecosystem.
Nonetheless, concerns about the sustainability of the recent surge persist, given its reliance on Blur’s reward scheme and the influence of a small number of whale traders.
