Coatue Management, a tech investment firm based in the United States, has made major changes to the value of its investments in non-fungible token (NFT) platform OpenSea and Web3 payment provider MoonPay.
The Information revealed this week that Coatue has reduced the value of its investment in OpenSea by 90%, cutting its holding from $120 million to $13 million. As a result, OpenSea’s on-paper valuation has dropped to $1.4 billion. Coatue cut their stake in MoonPay by 90% in addition to OpenSea.
This huge OpenSea discount contrasts with the company’s previous investment successes. OpenSea received $300 million in Series C fundraising in January 2022, backed by crypto venture capital company Paradigm and Coatue. At the time, the investment resulted in a $13.3 billion valuation for OpenSea.
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What Is the State of the NFT Market?
OpenSea, like other NFT industry companies, has been facing a bear market, less pronounced in the cryptocurrency industry, and a year-long fall in NFT trading activity. OpenSea has announced a 50% personnel cut and plans to rebrand the platform as OpenSea 2.0.
According to OpenSea CEO Devin Fizner, the next version of the platform will prioritize technology upgrades, increased speed, and improved quality. The decision to reduce the team size is expected to improve the platform’s agility and responsiveness to market conditions.
Coatue’s investment cut corresponds to a broader trend in the NFT space. NFT trading volumes peaked in 2021, with more than $14 billion in sales recorded for the year. Since the surge, NFT popularity has steadily declined, with global trading volumes falling by 80% since March 2022.
Despite the market’s collapse, there have been some recent indicators of a probable trend reversal. According to crypto monitoring firm DappRadar, the NFT market had its first month-over-month growth in volume and value in almost a year in October, with a $99 million month-over-month increase.
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