Monthly NFT buyers dip below 800K as searches ‘fall off a cliff’

cointelegraph.com:

The unique number of NFT buyers in February dipped below 800,000 for the first time since October, and search volume for nonfungibles also dropped significantly.

According to data from CryptoSlam, there were 796,009 NFT buyers on secondary markets in Feb. (down 12% compared to Jan.) that accounted for roughly $2.6 billion worth of sales (down 40% on the month before).

A caveat to that however, is that January was a massive month for NFTs which may suggest the decreases in February are simply part of a relatively healthy pullback. January saw a record number of unique secondary NFT buyers at 904,13 and OpenSea also posted record sales volume in January totaling around $5 billion before pulling back to around $3 billion last month.

Looking at Google Trends, however, it appears that global keyword search volume for “NFTs” has also dropped significantly. Over the past week, interest has dropped roughly 60-70% from the heights of late January (Jan. 23- Jan.29.)

The U.S. represents the most interest globally at the time of writing while Japan currently shows the lowest interest in NFTs out of 61 nations, despite local tech and telecommunications giant Rakuten launching an NFT marketplace late last month.

NFT proponent and managing partner of NFT investment fund Sfermion Andrew Steinwold likened the current pullback to the bull market and subsequent crash of 2017/2018, as he questioned whether interest will pick back up again anytime soon.

Worldwide NFT search volume fell off a cliffReminds me A LOT of the crypto 2017 bull market and subsequent 2018 bear market How long will the disinterest last until it starts to pick back up? Or will it? pic.twitter.com/4iQxcpLuYP

Specific reasons why general interest has waned so dramatically