Cryptocurrency
Are NFT markets in a death spiral or ready for a resurgence?
Nonfungible tokens (NFTs) saw a massive surge in popularity in 2021, accompanied by sky-high prices, but the market has since come crashing back to earth, and it’s unclear whether there will be a resurgence.
NFTs are unique digital tokens recorded on a blockchain to certify ownership and authenticity. They can’t be copied or substituted but can be transferred and sold by their owner.
According to analytics platform NFTGo, the NFT market cap valued in Ether (ETH) is down 40.59% over the past year at the time of writing, with trading volume down 40.81%.
The market cap in U.S. dollars is down 41.16%, and its volume has dropped 66.77%. At the same time, market sentiment is ranked 13 out of 100, with an overall rating of “cold.”
Arno Bauer, senior solution architect at BNB Chain, told Cointelegraph that from a utility perspective, NFT projects are increasingly adding value and that this growth in functionality is where the future of NFTs likely lies.
Bauer said the NFT market is showing “promising signs of innovation and creativity,” which holds great potential for the growth and evolution of the tech.
Related: Crypto lawyer about SEC: ‘Problematic to imply all NFTs are securities’
“Market sentiment, cultural shifts towards digital ownership, and the potential for NFTs to be integrated into various aspects of our lives also contribute to a positive outlook for the future of NFTs,” he said.
“While current market conditions might seem subdued, the ongoing innovation and potential for integration with both digital and physical worlds suggest that NFTs have not had their day and that their continued relevance and growth are highly probable,” Bauer added.
NFTs in the long term
As for long-term use cases, Bauer said NFTs will “likely evolve” over time and become increasingly linked to real-world assets, such as property ownership or unique physical goods.
Currently, NFTs have been most successful in the art world, with some selling for tens of millions of dollars.
Digital artist Pak sold an NFT project titled “The Merge” for $91.8 million on Nifty Gateway in 2021, while Mike Winkelmann, also known as Beeple, sold “Everydays: The First 5000 Days” for $69.3 million via Christie’s auction house the same year.
Blockchain games also use NFTs to represent in-game items such as weapons and armor, and there is speculation the tech will make the jump to mainstream games. Various types of music assets are also being sold as one-of-a-kind NFTs.
Bauer thinks that as more robust technology provides enhanced use cases and ownership security, NFTs will likely become more attractive to mainstream markets.
He speculated that NFTs could link to financial instruments, representing shares in companies or investment funds, and social achievements, where they could symbolize badges of accomplishment in various fields.
“Beyond art, the ability to tokenize unique assets and provide verifiable ownership will create numerous applications across various domains,” Bauer said.
“Collaborations with traditional industries, technological advancements, clear regulatory frameworks and educational efforts can significantly boost NFT utility and adoption.”
“Addressing sustainability concerns could make them more appealing to a broader audience,” he added.
NFTs have the potential to make a comeback
Jason Bailey, co-founder and CEO of NFT tool and self-custody solution ClubNFT, told Cointelegraph he thinks “NFTs will come back and go mainstream” because crypto and NFTs rebound cyclically, just like previous tech crashes.
According to data gathering platform Statista, the NFT market is projected to continue growing in revenue, users and market capitalization.
As of 2023, there are 13.95 million NFT users, but that’s expected to hit 19.31 million users by 2027.
However, Bailey believes NFTs currently have some issues, most of which were amplified by rampant market speculation, that need to be solved before NFTs can go mainstream.
He said NFTs and the ecosystem around them are so complex that almost everyone is still vulnerable to many risks they may not even know about.
“Many of us have been trying to educate and onboard people into the space thoughtfully so they can be safe, but the truth is that NFTs won’t go mainstream until the complexity is replaced with a safe-by-default easy path,” Bailey said.
“For example, the vast majority of people don’t realize that an NFT is almost always at risk in a sense, except for fully on-chain NFTs, which are a truly tiny fraction.”
“The steps needed to protect the art from disappearing, and prevent the NFT from breaking, are complicated, time-consuming and error-prone,” he added.
Related: AI-based tools bring security and transparency to the NFT market
Bailey believes that in the long term, NFTs or similar tech could prove invaluable in validating digital documents such as marriage certificates, diplomas and licenses.
Overall, he thinks NFTs solve too many of the current problems associated with digital ownership — including scarcity, authentication, provenance and provable ownership — to be ignored.
“We need to build infrastructure now, during the bear market, for smoother onboarding and to protect NFT adopters from malicious actors in the next NFT bull market,” he said.
“Once these issues are solved, NFTs will absolutely go mainstream because the train of digital ownership left the station decades ago, and there is no stopping it.”
Meaningful projects could be a game changer for NFTs
Speaking to Cointelegraph, Andy Ku, founder and CEO of digital content Web3 ecosystem Altava Group, said he thinks the previous highs in the NFT market were based on a hype cycle, so it’ll be hard for an individual NFT to reach such lofty heights again.
asked google bard to write me some tweets about NFT market right now…
mf really went for the throat on these… pic.twitter.com/aLjUbwH3gT
— beeple (@beeple) August 22, 2023
According to CoinGecko, many of the top NFT collections have seen significant drops in value over the past year.
At the time of writing, Bored Ape Yacht Club has fallen by 67.1%, CryptoPunks by 33.2%, Mutant Ape Yacht Club by 59.2% and Azuki by 49.3%.
Ku believes that if we can see more meaningful NFT projects on the market offering tangible benefits to more people, then it’s possible to have the combined volume bring the overall market value up.
Related: What’s next for NFTs and Web3 in the age of the creator economy?
“NFTs should offer value and utility beyond just a digital art or PFP. The two areas I particularly believe in are asset-backed NFTs and a membership NFT,” he said.
“NFT’s core value of being an immutable representation of something is a great fit for assets and membership.”
NFTs for subscription, membership-based models and loyalty programs are starting to gain traction, with examples in hospitality venues and gyms already on the market.
“In terms of asset-backed NFTs, master artworks, real estate and precious metals like gold are all good examples of assets in which people believe,” Ku said.
“NFTs would make a great proof-of-ownership for these assets as well as being extremely portable,” he added.
The following five factors are more rocket fuel for prices to rally in XRP markets at the right time in 2025, even though the asset remains far from its early 2025 peak.
1. Bullish 15-Day Cup and Handle Pattern
XRP’s daily trading price continued in mid-April to trace a 90-day falling flag pattern visible at the 1Y view. Moreover, the indicator exhibits the classic declining trend in daily exchange volume. This pattern often signals an end to corrective bear markets and a reversion to the broader bullish trend.
Furthermore, at the 1M view, XRP’s price rounds out converging trend lines on the falling flag trace with a textbook bullish cup and handle pattern over 15 days from Apr. 2 to Apr. 17.
The cup formation spans 10 days from Apr. 2 to Apr. 12 and the slightly downward listing range channel forming the handle appeared from then until Apr. 17, according to data from CoinMarketCap.
Ripple token trading exhibited declining 24H trade volume from above $16 billion in the cup’s middle to below $3 billion during the handle portion of the chart technical indicator.
According to Investopedia, “The cup and handle is considered a bullish signal, with the right-hand side of the pattern typically experiencing lower trading volume.”
2. HNWI Manager: Institutions Quietly Stockpile XRP
Major institutions are stacking up #XRP behind the scenes while keeping the public in the dark. The current price is merely a shadow of what’s coming. When XRP transforms into the foundation of international finance, today’s hesitation will become tomorrow’s regret. In my…
— Jake Claver, QFOP (@beyond_broke) April 10, 2025
There’s no doubt of institutional interest in XRP because of the spot ETF applications at the SEC and Ripple’s partnerships with big global financial clearinghouses.
But Cheyenne, Wyoming-based family office wealth director Jake Claver had a hot tip for altcoin investors on Apr. 10. He said in a note on X that, “Major institutions are stacking up #XRP behind the scenes while keeping the public in the dark.”
“The current price is merely a shadow of what’s coming,” Claver added. “In my opinion, nothing in crypto space offers this level of certainty and potential for massive returns.”
Some repliers challenged Claver to show any evidence of the provocative claim.
While part of the claim is that the major players are keeping such evidence scant, one bit of circumstantial evidence is the frequent sightings in 2024 and 2025 by blockchain explorers of tremendous whale-sized XRP transactions.
131,000,000 #XRP (273,945,648 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to unknown wallethttps://t.co/CnMiTrxABL
— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) April 15, 2025
More direct evidence would be the public knowledge that banks like Santander, American Express, SBI Holdings, PNC, and Commonwealth Bank use XRP to make large international transfers.
That’s what XRP is built for.
3. XRP ETF Applications Top Ten at US SEC
2x leveraged XRP ETF is *currently* live & trading…
I simply don’t see this SEC not approving spot XRP ETF.
And sooner, rather than later.
— Nate Geraci (@NateGeraci) April 16, 2025
Bitcoin’s price cranked up 166% within two quarters from $27,400 in Oct. 2023 to $73,000 in Mar. 2024. The rally revolved around the first Bitcoin ETF approvals by the SEC in Jan. 2024.
In mid-April, XRP had 10 spot ETF applications in the queue at the SEC, according to Paris, France-based blockchain research firm Kaiko. That highlights impending demand for Ripple tokens by institutional investors.
The second-most applications out of the crypto segment was five for Solana. Dogecoin and Litecoin had three each pending at the SEC in mid-April. Kaiko projects XRP will be the next blockchain currency to get a spot ETF in the US.
4. X Buzz Over Possible SWIFT Partnership
April 16 and April 21 could become the two most important dates in XRP’s history.
And I’m not saying this for hype. I’m saying it because of context, data, and a narrative that’s been building for years.
Let’s start with April 16:
It’s the deadline for Ripple to submit its…
— John Squire (@TheCryptoSquire) April 13, 2025
Meanwhile, popular Crypto X provocateur John Squire, “The Crypto Squire,” famous to over half a million followers, suggested on Apr. 13 that SWIFT could start using XRP as soon as April.
“In 2023, Ripple already participated in interoperability pilot programs led by SWIFT,” Squire wrote. “More recently, SWIFT published a report discussing the integration of Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT)… XRP was part of that conversation.”
Popular Crypto X #XRPArmy booster Amonyx fanned the flames with a video of YouTube business podcaster and motivational speaker Patrick Bet-David pumping XRP in terms of SWIFT payments market share.
Even without a SWIFT partnership, as Ripple captures any significant portion of forward market share growth in SWIFT’s trillion-dollar payments businesses, XRP prices are apt to skyrocket once more.
5. XRP Price Support From Froggy Bitcoin Market
Finally in this list, there’s the support for XRP prices from directly adjacent Bitcoin exchange markets that cyclically draw up vast amounts of capital inflows.
Brokers make BTC sales to individuals and organizations from all walks of life across the planet, at all levels of wealth from third world laborer individual investors to the US government.
Because XRP is a direct trading pair with Bitcoin on dozens of highly liquid currency exchange platforms, BTC generates an enormous long-term support for the former’s value.
While stocks continued to swoon in April over Trump tariffs realigning global trade deals, Bitcoin decoupled from other “risk” markets and went for a cool mid-month rally.
Wall Street Bitcoin ETFs joined the rally in a potential preview of price support from mainstream financial integrations with XRP via the pending Ripple ETFs.
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse remarked in April that he sees Bitcoin’s price topping $200,000 in 2025. Another analyst noted that in March and April, Bitcoin whales have been buying BTC like never before.
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The cryptocurrency market took a sudden dive in the past couple of hours, with the XRP price making no exceptions.
XRP Price Tumbles but Funding Rates Surprise
XRP tumbled by around 2% in the past hour, bringing its total losses to about 8% for the last day. At the time of this writing, the cryptocurrency is trading at around $2.04.
That said, the funding rates on XRP derivatives positions are currently positive. What this means in Layman’s terms is that traders who have long positions are paying those who have short positions. In other words, the sentiment on the derivatives market is currently positive.
Could this mean that the XRP price is about to rebound? Not necessarily – positive funding rates only indicate the prevailing sentiment but sentiment is not necessarily tied up to the short-term price action. Short positions could pile up to “farm” the positive funding rates until the market regulates itself into an equilibrium.
Crypto Markets Plunge
Elsewhere, the broader crypto market is also declining.
As seen in the heatmap above, Bitcoin’s price is trading at around $84,000, down by around 1% on the day, but the losses some altcoins are charting are considerably higher.
For example, Dogecoin (DOGE) is down 8%, Cardano (ADA) is down 6.6%, and so forth.
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XRP continues to consolidate with low volatility across its BTC and USDT pairs. Price action is tight, holding above major support but struggling to gain bullish momentum.
By Edris Derakhshi
XRP Price Analysis: The USDT Chart
XRP is holding just above the $2.00 support zone and the 200-day moving average, located around the same price mark.
The $2.00 level has acted as key demand throughout April, with multiple wicks into that zone being bought up quickly. However, bullish follow-through has been weak, and the price remains compressed between $2.00 and the $2.40–$2.60 resistance zone.
Momentum is neutral as the RSI hovers around the 50 mark. Bulls need to reclaim $2.60 to confirm strength and open the way toward the $3.00–$3.10 resistance. If the 200 DMA fails to hold, the next major supports are at $1.40 and $1.
XRP Price Analysis: The BTC Paired Chart
XRP is still in a downtrend against BTC, with a clear sequence of lower highs since the peak in January. The price is now just above the 2,400 SAT level but well below the 2,800 SAT resistance zone.
The 200 DMA near 2,100 remains a key level to watch if the decline continues.
This pair continues to show relative weakness, and reclaiming 2,800 SAT is critical to shift the short-term trend. As long as XRP/BTC fails to break above that structure, upside will likely remain capped.
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Cryptocurrency charts by TradingView.
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