On January 6, 2023, Expresso celebrated its 50th anniversary. This day was celebrated with many guests directly or indirectly related to Expresso. But the celebration was not only about the past, the future was also present: a traditional newspaper and now 50 years old, on its anniversary, Expresso joined the NFT market.
On the Open Sea platform, 50 NFTs of the newspaper’s first cover were for sale, which hit newsstands on January 6, 1973. The headline stated that “63 percent of Portuguese have never voted”. It was a rare survey in the days of the dictatorship, and to put the finger on the wound of the dictatorship. Nowadays, Expresso’s first cap is a relic or bargain: 50 NFT sold out in two days.
Guilherme Sanchez, a consultant on crypto assets, assisted Expresso in the project and was even amazed: “Interestingly, the development has been positive, despite the market downturn.” He explains that the Open Sea platform was chosen because it is “the best at the moment the shopWhere to sell. The chosen blockchain was Ethereum.
The Expresso NFT is worth it for its historical value, but not only. “To increase the value of the NFT, those who acquired it also received a digital subscription to the newspaper,” recalls Guilherme Sanchez.
The fact is that on the 6th of January, the purchase value of each of the 50 NFTs was 0.025 Ethereum, which is equivalent to about 30 euros. The value is currently 0.12 Ethereum, which is around €170 at current conversion rates.
But let’s go back to the beginning and explain all this.
What is NFT?
NFT is an abbreviation for “non-fungible token”, in Portuguese “non-fungible token”, that is, a unique token / token, which It cannot be replaced or dealt with Is that Computer file based.
Nuno Costa, NFT collector and creator, turns the definition on its head to make it easier for those who don’t understand. “A fungible item is, for example, money. This is because I can exchange a five-euro note for another five, the value is the same and can be added. A non-fungible token is something unique, it is not divisible and cannot be repeated. It can even be copied, but it will never be the original, because it is unique. – It can be determined in this way.
The parallel between the NFT market and the art market has been made countless times by investors or market experts. This is because both economies are driven by the fact that the market dictates the value of a work, because the intrinsic value of a work of art (the price of the materials and work involved) is often less than the price people would like. to push. The only difference is that NFT is not tangible and is currently being traded on an unregulated market.
Those who invest in NFT are confident that what they bought can be sold at a higher price – that is, it will go up. The same thing happens in art: buyers decide how much a painting is worth when they are willing to pay a certain price to buy it.
There is a moment of transactional heyday in NFT selling, because the more interest investors have, the more interest there is in this digital number. It’s called FOMO (Fear of missing out, in Portuguese, fear of exclusion), that is, “If everyone is investing in NFTs, why shouldn’t I be investing too?” Nuno Costa explains, adding that this is how the sale value goes up.
The idea that an NFT is a unique piece can also be compared to the art universe, since “a painting cannot be repeated, even if painted by the same artist, the painting is unique because the brushstrokes will always be different”. The same applies to NFT, eg There is only one original, only this has value and this validity is proven by blockchain.
In the opinion of Diogo Pereira Duarte, Co-Coordinator of the Financial Law Area at Abreu Advogados and Professor at the Faculty of Law in Lisbon, this is a market with “a lot of illiteracy, ignorance and speculation”. To justify this, he gives an example of a monkey NFT, which “takes on values out of proportion to its usefulness.”
Blockchain: The Ledger of All “Cryptocurrency Transactions”
Through blockchain technology – the basis of cryptocurrencies – It is possible to see the history of owners, the number and date of sale. In essence, the blockchain acts as a public ledger.
Every NFT has a digital contract that sends you a code to the Blockchain with all of your information, which cannot be changed. Nuno Costa explains that “it is this contract that is then sent to file. It can be a “gif”, or a picture, or a song, and in the future it can be a house contract or a passportinto a potential centralized blockchain future.
Given the versatility of this digital market, Nuno Costa and Guilherme Sanchez believe NFT is here to stay, even if the current field is discouraging.
Alcohol market
According to Nuno Costa, the market collapsed with the war in Ukraine. The macroeconomic panorama shows just that.” At this time, the number of transactions is much lower, which makes prices more stagnant.
He explains that the investment he made in mid-2020 in NFT had an excellent return in the first eight months. But he admits, “If he were to sell today, he would lose about 80%.” […] Most deferred are historical NFTs.”
Despite this, both investors expect an encouraging future. “This is a market with a lot of potential and innovation in its model and a market capable of bringing what was collectible reality, ‘old school’, for a digital collectible reality,” says Guilherme Sanchez. He also believes that the NFT market is an approach to young people and the future of the digital world.
Diogo Pereira Duarte adds that the NFT market has “infinite potential” and stresses the “usefulness of blockchain as a means of transferring value over the Internet,” stressing that he has no doubts that it “will be the digital future.” Speculation in this market makes some entities take advantage of some people’s illiteracy, using FOMO as well [fear of missing out, ou em tradução direta, o “medo de ficar de fora”]from those who want to get rich quickly.
For now, we can say that it is a market that is still being explored a bit. Over time, we will find out if these digital assets are here to stay.