After seeing a decline in demand, former U.S. president Trump’s digital trading cards are once again on the increase.
Donald Trump’s NFT collection has condensed much of the wild volatility of the NFT market into its first five weeks of existence: it was widely ridiculed but ultimately sold out, then prices and sales surged before falling. Now, sales are once again increasing.
The daily sales volume for the official Trump Digital Trading Cards collection increased by about 800% from Tuesday to Wednesday, increasing from approximately $34,000 to over $306,000.
This is according to data from the analytics platform CryptoSlam, which indicates continued strength with over $241,000 in sales thus far today. At one point this morning, the website’s 24-hour trade volume had increased by 1,900% compared to the prior reporting period.
The daily trading volume of NFTs increased, as did the average sale price. Tuesday had 115 total transactions with an average sale price of $296 worth of ETH per NFT. Yesterday, the number of NFTs traded rose to 704 at an average price of $435 per. So far today, the average price of a sale is approximately $670.
According to statistics from NFT Floor Price, which monitors the price of the cheapest-listed NFT across leading marketplaces, the starting price has nearly doubled from $235 worth of ETH at the beginning of Wednesday to $454 at the time of writing. The price temporarily exceeded $500 this morning.
Twitter reaction to Trump’s rising NFT
Although there is no concrete explanation for the sudden increase in activity, some Crypto Twitter users assume that increased demand is related to a report that the disgraced former president of the United States is intending to return to mainstream social media networks. Facebook and Twitter banned him for instigating the January 6 attacks on the United States Capitol.
Trump trading card NFTs quietly up 2x overnight… I think the boomers still don't know how to use Polygon pic.twitter.com/XtBsvaKfeI
— 6445.eth(@sully_finance) January 19, 2023
NBC News reported on Wednesday, based on documents it reviewed, that Trump’s staff has petitioned Facebook to reinstate his accounts. Elon Musk just unbanned his Twitter account after the Tesla and SpaceX CEO bought the social media platform late last year.
Trump’s NFT collection
Trump’s collection of NFT trading cards came out on December 15. The 45,000 digital collectibles were made on Polygon, an Ethereum sidechain, and show the former politician as a superhero, cowboy, astronaut, and in other fantastical roles. Each of the $99 collectibles came with a chance to win something special, like dinner with Trump or a meet-and-greet.
Even though a lot of people, including some of Trump’s supporters, called his project a cash grab, the 44,000 NFTs that were for sale to the public (another 1,000 were held back) sold out in 24 hours. In the days that followed, prices on the secondary market went up. On December 17, when “Saturday Night Live” made fun of the project, the starting price was close to $1,000.
On that date, the daily trading volume reached over $3.5 million but fell shortly thereafter. The project hit a daily low of slightly more than $21,000 worth of NFT trades on January 8, a decline of 99.0% compared to the peak day. Even when prices decreased, the owners of the cheapest listed collectibles demanded at least double the original mint price.
Fear of missing out (FOMO) hype among collectors and investors, especially flippers who look for buzzy projects with quick returns, often causes NFT projects to reach their peak quickly. Most projects can’t keep up that kind of speed for a long time.
But, just like with meme coins like Dogecoin and Shiba Inu, social media sentiment can easily change the trading demand for NFT projects.