Devin Finzer, the Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of OpenSea, has said that they are working on OpenSea 2.0. Furthermore, Devin has emphasized that they have every intention of sticking with Ethereum as it brings better speed and cheaper fees. While he didn’t downplay Bitcoin directly, Devin clearly said Bitcoin may limit its use cases to art types versus more diverse stuff.
The statement comes against the backdrop of the growing popularity of NFTs. There was a decline in the sector, evidenced by a decline in overall sales volume. Reports have cited that sales volume fell to $8.7 billion during the 2023 slowdown.
Over the past thirty days, the tables have turned as the NFT sphere tries to make a comeback. According to reports, transaction volume in the last quarter was better than in previous quarters. In December alone, a transaction volume of $1.775 billion was recorded. The same amount between the previous two months, October and November, was $918 million.
Bitcoin has taken the lead in the NFT industry. Transaction volume for NFTs on the network was approximately $692 million over the past 30 days. On the other hand, Ethereum recorded a figure of $320 million.
There is a growing popularity of chains for NFTs. Solana NFTs and Ordinals are among the top contenders, but Ethereum lags behind despite better numbers in USD sales.
Nevertheless, Devin is confident in what Ethereum has to offer: economic costs and better speed. That allows developers to come up with applications that fall under a broader category in the ecosystem.
Another aspect that Devin has downplayed is that OpenSea is starting to fall behind in the market. New players like OKX NFT and Blur have overtaken the market, creating room for more marketplaces. Devin has said he is aware of this but is not affected by it as transaction volume can sometimes be misleading. He said this and justified the statement by explaining that the market often incentivizes traders with their own tokens in the form of a reward.
Work is now underway on OpenSea 2.0. Devin has said it would be an enhanced version of the NFT marketplace, with NFTs listed on the platform based on use cases rather than transaction volume. The goal is to have a marketplace with an interface suitable for every type of use
Devin Finzer’s support for the Ethereum network could be one of the many reasons why the network’s native token remains above $2.5k on the market. While there has been no report of a market crash, both dominant tokens appear to be struggling to keep up with the momentum created following the approval of Bitcoin ETF applications. BTC is well below the $43,000 mark, while ETH is comfortably above the $2.5,000 mark.