Is Beeple’s ‘Everydays: The First 5000 Days’ Really Worth $69M?

With the NFT craze in full force, top NFT artist Beeple recently sold his piece,‘Everydays: The First 5000 Days’ at auction for $69 million. What is interesting about this specific instance is that there will not be another way to price the piece unless it is sold again. Contrast this with Bitcoin’s 24/7 trading: the price of Bitcoin was volatile from 2017-now, with the price reaching over $19,000, then seeing lows in the $3,000s, before passing $60,000 today.

With Beeple’s piece, the current unknown owner could hold it for years, waiting for the right moment to sell it at a higher price. It could be the equivalent of buying Bitcoin at $19,000 in 2017 and then learning in 2021 that it is worth $60,000… without the emotional toll of seeing an 85% loss on paper.

Should NFTs prove to be overvalued at this time, many pieces will still be listed on marketplaces, like OpenSea or Rarible, and owners of those pieces may see sales of even rare pieces at much less than they purchased them for. But a collector holding a one of one piece will not.

This begs the question of whether ‘5000 Days’ could be an income generating asset for the owner, whether using it in an entrepreneurial sense, as a tax haven, or by borrowing against it. There are also opinions that the purchaser may be using the purchase to launder money, a common occurrence in the art world, but that’s not a strategy I can recommend.

Let’s check back in if it ever sells again!