Collect, earn and speculate on digital trading cards
The idea of owning a piece of history immortalized as a collectible is desirable on many levels. As children, we were presented with fun and engaging ways to collect our favorite football or other sporting teams’ players as stickers or cards. Importantly, their scarcity, value, and design all added to their value. Today, some physical collectible cards sell for millions of dollars and the same is happening in the digital trading card space.
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have ushered in the advent of digital collectibles. In essence, an NFT is a completely unique class of tokens. Bitcoin and Ethereum are ERC-20 tokens, they are not unique as many people hold them. By comparison, an NFT or ERC-721 token is a one-off and carries unique identifiers. In this instance it’s what gives the NFT its value, like Bitcoin, it’s scarcity.
Remember the excitement as you ripped open a pack and saw one of the legendary shiny cards poking out? Or when you received another copy of a well sought-after card that you knew your pals at school would trade? Well, the excitement is back. In digital format. Here are 5 digital trading cards to take you back to your childhood.
MLB Baseball
Major League Baseball, or MLB, has been at the forefront of the trading card industry in the United States for many decades. Trading card company Topps has been a major player in this industry. Now, Topps and in collaboration with the Wax blockchain launched the MLB Baseball 2021 Series 1 collection. Most likely more series and seasons will follow in the coming months and years.
William Shatner collection
One of the world’s most iconic and beloved actors, William Shatner, released a series of trading cards on WAX featuring never-before-seen pictures from his personal life and career. The series of 10,000 packs containing 135,000 NFTs sold out in just nine minutes! Cards are now available on the secondary markets and with some depicting Shatner’s firstborn and memorable acting moments. This collection represents a very unique opportunity to own a piece of history.
Garbage Pail Kids
In collaboration with the WAX blockchain, US collectibles company Topps launched its very first set of digital cards in the early Summer of 2020. The original series 1 of the Garbage Pail Kids bubble gum cards, which originally launched in 1985 were made available. Since that time season, 2 has been released to massive success. Cards are now available for purchase on the Wax blockchain secondary markets. Start building your collection today!
Sorare fantasy football
Back in the 90’s we had the massively popular Merlin and Panini physical football collectibles. All your favorite players were represented as a sticker for you to collect. Now, Sorare, a fantasy football platform that allows players to collect and use cards depicting footballers has 90,000 active users per month. Players use these NFT cards to create a team and earn points. Game rounds happen twice per week, and now for the first time, it tracks player performances at the Copa America and Euro 2020. With new teams, players, and competitions being added regularly Sorare is not a static collecting opportunity but a fully playable game giving players the chance to show off their NFTs and win!
NBA Top Shot
Playable either via browser or mobile app through Samsung Galaxy Store, NBA Top Shot is also the first dapp to use Dapper’s new Flow blockchain. In terms of the collectible element, NBA Top Shot is based around video moments of the spectacular on-court action, which are graded in various rarities and sold either in packs or singly by collectors through the peer-to-peer marketplace. To date, over $2 million has been spent on packs.