Gm, coolkidz.

It's been a wild and bloody week in crypto. I'm sure you've heard about the collapse of FTX, users unable to withdraw funds, NFTs being the “exit route”, and even Trojan horses (FTX is hacked!!) on the platform. A word of advice: Avoid FTX for the time being and move your crypto to a cold wallet. Not your keys, definitely not your coins.

Doom and gloom aside, welcome back to What's Brand New!

For those who are new, we bring you the biggest NFT and web3 brand news every week, keeping you well-informed on what’s brand new in the space.

Here's our content in-brief:

- Another competitor enters the NFT ring: Kraken will launch a marketplace with 70 Ethereum And Solana NFT Collections

- Exclusive Soccer-themed NFT Collection: Visa and Crypto.com launched an NFT auction ahead of Qatar FIFA World Cup

- A turn of events on OS Royalties: NFT Marketplace OpenSea to allow royalties on all collections after receiving complaints from the community.

- Celebrate World Cup 2022 With Challenges From OKX: Football meets Web3 - OKX Football Festival with $3M in prizes has started.

- How The FTX Shitshow Has Affected NFTs: Prices for Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTS declined after the FTX collapse.

If you’d like to see more of NFT Paris’ content, be sure to check out our website and Twitter!

Without further ado, let's get started!

Kraken To Launch "No Fees" Marketplace Platform With 70 Ethereum And Solana NFT Collections

Kraken, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world, has recently announced the launch of a "gasless" NFT marketplace platform that will initially include 70 collections on the Ethereum and Solana blockchains.

With the introduction of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to its large 6 million customer user base, Kraken aims to become a competitor of the popular NFT platform OpenSea, which dominates the NFT space in terms of sales and popularity.

Although alternatives like LooksRare are available on the market, OpenSea has achieved the impressive performance of monopolizing NFT sales for the past few years, and Kraken plans to stop that monopoly.

Speaking about the NFT marketplace launch, a spokesperson for the company has said that Kraken seeks to accelerate financial freedom, and independence, in a statement related to the event.

The newly launched marketplace aims to be one of the most secure and easy to use in the NFT ecosystem, with unique features such as gasless transactions, NFT malware protection, and built-in rarity tools that allow users to evaluate the rarity of their NFTS. The marketplace is only available to users who joined the waiting list in May 2022.

Visa and Crypto.com Launched A NFT Auction In Anticipation of the 2022 Qatar FIFA World Cup

Visa Inc. launched a World Cup-themed NFT auction early this week (on November 8), in collaboration with Crypto.com, one of the fastest-growing cryptocurrency platforms in the world.

The payment cards company, which is also one of the official sponsors and the payment service provider for the 2022 Qatar World Cup, aims to bring together art, football, and the NFT ecosystem, by offering soccer fans a one-of-a-kind set of Web3 experiences.

Called "Visa Masters of Movement", the NFT auction included digital art created by 3D motion studio XK studios and inspired by iconic goals scored by five legendary soccer players, namely Michael Owen, Carli Lloyd, Jared Borgetti, Tim Cahill, and Maxi Rodriguez. Those who won the auction will also receive an autograph from the football player featured in the NFT.

Football fans who become eligible after the auction will be able to create their legendary soccer moves as digital art, at the much-anticipated FIFA Fan Festival event that will take place from November 19 to December 18, in Doha, Qatar.

All proceeds from the Visa Masters of Movement NFT auction will go to Street Child United, a London-based global movement and charity organization that helps street children through football and sports.

NFT Marketplace OpenSea Will Allow Creator Royalties On All Collections, After Community Backlash

The world's largest NFT marketplace platform OpenSea announced the introduction of an on-chain creator tool that allows users to enforce royalties on newly created NFT collections.

However, the new royalties feature, launched on November 7, did not initially apply to collections launched previously to the announcement, which has upset a lot of NFT creators and other figures of the Web3 space.

Among those who complained are the Bored Ape founders Greg Solano, Kerem Atalay, and Wylie Aronow, who described the move as "Not great", in a post related to the topic. Bobby Kim, the founder of the iconic streetwear brand "The Hundreds", said that he will cancel the release of his upcoming NFT collection to protest the new OpenSea royalties policy.

After hearing the criticism from the community, OpenSea decided to change their decision and allow royalties for previously-released NFT collections as well, saying that they hear the feedback "loud and clear". The announcement to reinstate royalties for creators was made on November 8 in a post on the official OpenSea Twitter page.

Football Meets The Web3 World - OKX Football Festival With $3M In Prizes Has Started

OKX.com, one of the leading cryptocurrency exchanges on the market, has recently announced the launch of the OKX Football Festival, an event that aims to be a Web3 version of this year's main sporting event, the World Cup Qatar 2022.

Participants in the OKX football event, which started on November 8, will compete for limited-edition NFTs, exclusive experiences, and a share of the $3M prize pool.

The virtual football festival will feature three events, the NFT Football Cup, which started on November 8, followed by the OKX Football Cup Trading Competition, and the Earn Super Hattrick series.

Fans can mint up to three NFTS for free, each corresponding to their favorite football team. Stacking $10 USDT per NFT is required, but that amount will return to each participant when the event ends.

Rewards of over $20k USDT will be split among players (NFT owners) every time they knock out a competitor team and move up in the group stage.

Prices for Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTS Decline After FTX Crushes The Entire Crypto Market

The Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT project is seeing a price decline amid a cryptocurrency market downturn caused by the FTX exchange platform. Earlier this week, FTX encountered a liquidity crunch, allegedly caused by Sam Bankman-Fried's mismanagement of the company.

In an attempt to save the market from going into a downward spiral, Changpeng Zhao (the founder and CEO of Binance) has announced they will acquire FTX, which seemed to have a good effect on the market for a few hours, but could not stop the prices for crypto tokens from declining.

Cryptocurrencies are not the only ones affected by the market crash, as the nightmare has also spread to the NFT space. The lowest price at which a Bored Ape NFT can sell, or the floor price, is currently at 57 ETH or approximately $72,000, down 82% from the all-time high of $430,000, seen in April 2022.

The collapse of FTX and the market are the main factors causing Bored Ape NFT prices to fall. Other factors contributing to the decline include BendDAO - a lending protocol that allows NFT collaterals - which has recently auctioned off 14 Bored Apes NFTS that got bids lower than the floor price, or users moving to alternative NFT collections like CryptoPunks.

And that's a wrap!

Thanks for staying till the end, and we hope you’re now better informed on NFT brand activity this week in the space.

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Back to the FTX drama, our deepest sympathies for all who have funds stuck in FTX. Will definitely be watching CT closely the next couple of days for updates, but till then, stay #SAFU. We'll keep you notified via Twitter!

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Hope to see you IRL at NFT Paris, February 2023! Till next time, coolkidz.

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