Attention often feels like the scarcest resource in crypto—which is saying something if you’ve been monitoring ETH block space lately. So when a new NFT project called Loot launched last week and unexpectedly took the crypto world by storm, we decided to scrap our plans and run an emergency newsletter.

Loot NFTs, as shown above, have no artistic value. They are nothing but 8 lines of computer-generated text on a black background. But this unprecedented form sparked lightning in a bottle, inspiring a massive and diverse community to start building a new metaverse together.

Since jumping into the space in 2013, I’ve only ever observed 3 communities as strong as Loot’s: Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Yearn. So as the initial hysteria calms down and speculators leave, I would carefully watch the community that remains, including its on-chain footprint. I have a feeling we are going to be covering Loot a lot more in the future.

This week our contributor analysts cover the Loot ecosystem.

• Loot has a simple concept. In the words of project creator Dom Hofmann, Loot is “text-based fantasy crypto loot,” where individual NFTs represent “bags” of loot containing different items. However, this simple concept has made a huge impact on the NFT scene, with the value of Loot NFTs appreciating from just the minting cost of gas to generating a 16KΞ daily volume (~$53M) on the secondary market in just 6 days. The volume seemed to fizzle out to more reasonable levels in the following days, similar to the way it rushed to the top.

• A steady decrease in the floor price of Loot NFTs, along with a decrease in volume, indicates that the hype around the project has subsided slightly since it started off at a fever pitch. Floor price took the biggest hit on September 4th, when the creator introduced More Loot, which created a dynamic supply of non-original loot. Even so, Loot changed the way we think about NFTs.

• Incredibly, Loot had more 7-day volume than CryptoPunks, BAYC, and ArtBlocks combined. Just a little while ago, all we were talking about was the amazing growth these projects were experiencing! Then, the “weird experiment” dropped. I believe stealing the spotlight is a huge understatement at this point.

• Dom, Loot’s creator, called Loot a weird experiment. What really is this experiment? In simple words: a jpeg with randomized adventurer gear. Dom wanted people to use these traits to make something, hence no images or stats were included, leaving everything open to interpretation of the Loot holders. The initial 2 days saw little sales volume for Loot. Once the community realized the potential Loot presented, the money started to flow in.

• What really ignited the project was when community members started making projects that complemented Loot, such as Ability Score, Realm, and Character score. Adventure Gold, AGLD, a token for loot holder member also helped in increasing the interest for Loot. At its peak AGLD was worth $ 7+ and had a market cap of more than $600 million.

• While speculators FOMO-ed into Loot, some communities came up with their own alternatives to Loot such as Bloot, The N project, Dope Wars, First First NFTs, and teh list goes on. This all led to Dom’s weird experiment along with projects inspired by it to cross 100K+ ETH in secondary sales.

• Bag secured! Loot has become one of the hottest projects in the NFT space topping OpenSea charts and Twitter newsfeeds. In the roughly two weeks since launch, OG Loot has done over 61,872 ETH in trading volume making it the 9th most traded NFT collection of all time on OpenSea. As of writing, Loot floor prices are in the ~7 ETH range. On September 2nd, a rare Divine Robe Loot Bag (Bag #748) sold for 250 ETH, the highest sale on record for the collection to date.

• There are currently over 2,500 unique holders of OG Loot. The top 10 wallets currently own 18.9% of the entire Loot supply.

• Funds like Robot Ventures and other whales have acquired sizable Loot collections. While total transactions and unique buyers have decreased slightly from their August 30th peak, this has not stopped a whale who has been on a buying spree acquiring a net of 237 OG Loot Bags in the last 7 days.

• Adventure Gold (AGLD) was airdropped to Loot holders and is a game token for future Loot-related games with no current use cases until the community decides. The market cap reached an all-time high of $600m. The total number of unique addresses reached 4,543 and has since decreased to 4,339, suggesting a low engagement. The total supply on exchanges has reached an all-time high at 41%. This is substantial for a token without links to an exchange and suggest holders have been looking for liquidity.

• On the second day of its launch, AGLD volume on Uniswap reached $250m, equivalent to the third most traded pair. A week after, its volume decreased by 90% representing only $23m. Challenges include a lack of staking (only 2% of total AGLD) and lack of utility beyond speculation.