READ TIME: ±4 minutes
Hello and Welcome to Alts Cafe for May 5th, 2022.
This is everything you need to know about what’s going on in the world of alternative assets.
Best enjoyed with your morning cup of coffee.
Let’s go!
Table of Contents
Pulse check: What’s the overall market doing?
Markets rebounded (and calmed slightly) this week as Chairman Powell downplayed talk of super-aggressive rate hikes.
What are we doing?
There are no changes to our fractional Alts picks this week.
Last week, ALTS1 acquired two assets:
- Star Wars Kenner Obi Wan Back A 12 AFA 85 @ $5,999 (value $8k)
- Daredevil #1 CGC 9.6 @ $140k (value $165k)
Crypto
Here’s what you need to know:
It’s been a good week for BTC and ETH, but secondary coins haven’t caught up yet.
Bullish News
- 20% of businesses in El Salvador now accept Bitcoin as a payment method.
- Mega investment firm Blackrock launched a “crypto-exposed” ETF.
- France became the first big European country to give Binance regulatory approval.
Bearish News
- Wikipedia has stopped accepting Ethereum and Bitcoin cash donations citing environmental concerns.
- The US Labor Department clapped back at last week’s Fidelity announcement that IRA investors can allocate up to 20% of their portfolio to crypto.
- Only nine of the top crypto currencies had a positive April.
What to do with that info:
Buy and hold.
NFTs
Here’s what you need to know:
Another week, another sh*t show of an NFT minting. I talked about it a bit in yesterday’s WC, so I won’t bore you, but TL;DR, the Bored Ape Otherside mint was a mess and cost people something like $150m gas fees.
You care about this, because it’s likely Yuga labs will use this as a reason to launch their own L2 chain.
Between that and Elon’s trolling yesterday, I think Yuga has lost some credibility this week.
Elon Musk literally made a collage of screenshotted bored apes his profile pic to troll NFT owners pic.twitter.com/V5lY1BJcv2
— Dr. Parik Patel, BA, CFA, ACCA Esq. (drpatel.eth) (@ParikPatelCFA) May 4, 2022
Akutars shat the bed too.
AkuDreams did a 3.5e Dutch Auction today that refunded anyone who purchased above the final resting price…but their contract was poorly written and had is susceptible to a griefing exploit that would cause the minting funds in the contract to be locked
— bender (@0xBender) April 22, 2022
Hasan tried to tell them
What to do with that info:
If you’re long into any of the Yuga labs stuff (and they claimed the top three spots on Opensea last week), you may want to watch out for sentiment turning negative.
Investor opportunities:
- I don’t know anything about Crypto Unicorns, but it looks fun and addictive, and those both spell $$$$ for play-to-earn (PTE) games.
- Memeland also looks like it’s going to be big. It’s backed by loads of A-Listers, and they’ve got a community of 200m people baked (some double counting there for sure).
Sports Cards
Here’s what you need to know:
Good week for sports cards on CardLadder and OnlyAlts, but the fractional marketplaces took a bit of a beating.
The week after I said F1 cards may have peaked, a Lewis Hamilton Superfractor sold for $900k, setting an all-time record for an F1 card (and it’s not far behind the ATH for a soccer card).
That said, the driver’s base PSA 10 card is off nearly 15% this month, so 🤷
Records were also set for Derek Jeter and Ja Morant cards.
What to do with that info:
Do you feel lucky? Maybe go buy some F1 cards. (Bloody not investment advice.)
Comics
Here’s what you need to know:
A 5.5-graded Incredible Hulk #1 sold for $54,000 at Heritage on May 1st, a new record for that grade. That’s a 50% jump over six months ago.
A CGC 4.5 graded Journey into Mystery #83 also sold for an ATH, hammering at $16,800.
Speaking of Thor, something is brewing in Asgard…
Jane Foster debuted at the new Thor eight years ago in the comics, but the films are just now catching up. The trailer for Thor: Love and Thunder was just released, and its climax introduces Natalie Portman in all her godly regalia.
It’s had 36m views already, including 3m in the first hour of its release.
What to do with that info:
Thor #1 (the 2014 version featuring Jane Foster as Thor) can still be found for $200 to $300 on eBay. That feels really cheap for a comic that’s getting its own Marvel film.
Wine
Here’s what you need to know:
The Liv-EX 1000 wine index continues to march upward despite some sad news in Oregon and France.
The broad index is up 9% on the year, compared to -10% for the S&P 500 and around 1% for sports cards.
Some of this demand is down to surging exports as Covid fades.
What to do with that info:
I keep waiting for wine to cool down, but it can’t stop, won’t stop. Check out Vinovest’s new trading platform if you fancy a punt. It’s really well-designed and easy to use.
Art
Here’s what you need to know:
Sotheby’s Banksy auction saw the highest proceeds ($4,191,456) of the 62 auctions cataloged by Rare Book Hub last week.
97% of the items at the auction were sold at prices above the high estimates. That’s very, very good, though the feature piece, Girl with Balloon, looks like it didn’t sell.
What to do with that info:
The fractional platform Otis has an original Banksy available trading around $330k ($15.51/sh) at the moment. Estimates for the piece are > $550k.
That’s all for this week. Hope you enjoyed your coffee and this edition of Alts Cafe.