What Is Moonbirds, the NFT Collection That Broke All Records in a Weekend?

Learn everything about the record-breaking NFT collection.

Moonbirds is an NFT collection by PROOF Collective, and within two days after the official mint, these pixel birds set some impressive records. Moonbirds consists of 10,000 utility-enabled PFPs, developed as the avatar collection for the PROOF Collective. The collection was launched on April 16th, and its average trading price shot up to over 40 ETH in less than ten days.

Summary:

To better understand Moonbirds NFTs as a phenomenon in the blockchain space, it is important to take a step back and look at the team behind this project. Created as the official PFP collection for the PROOF Collective, Moonbirds has this important connection going for it.

What is the PROOF Collective?

The PROOF Collective is a small but influential and relatively wealthy community of NFT collectors and artists. To join, one must hold the PROOF Collective NFT, a collection of 1,000 NFT passes with a floor price of 52 ETH at the time of writing.

Becoming a member gives users access to the forefront and exclusive information about the NFT world via Discord, Podcast, real-life events, and more. Plus, the club allows its members to participate in collaborative projects explicitly created for PROOF Collective members.

Projects by PROOF Collective:

As a closed-off society, details regarding this high-end NFT club are scarce. However, the official PROOF website shares that current holders of the 1,000 passes have more than 150,000 NFTs in their collections.

Moreover, a big chunk of this member portfolio includes more than 800 Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs and over 5,000 Art Blocks collectibles. In other words, PROOF members have both a lot of money and a good sense of valuable collectibles.

Check out DappRadar’s NFT Explorer to find more blue-chip NFT projects.

What do Moonbirds have to do with PROOF?

Moonbirds is a profile picture NFT collection created by the PROOF team as a way to denote its members. Notably, the Moonbirds collection is ten times larger than the original PROOF Collectors pass project. The idea is to allow a new group of NFT collectors to take advantage of the exclusive PROOF Discord channels and events.

Importantly, each PROOF Collective NFT had a spot to mint two Moonbirds NFTs. That means 20% of the Moonbirds collection was reserved for PROOF Collective members. Almost all the remaining Moonbird NFTs went to collectors outside the PROOF Collective through an allowlist mechanism. A total of 125 Moonbirds NFTs went to the PROOF Treasury for future collaborations and marketing campaigns.

How does holding a Moonbird NFT benefit collectors?

NFTs usually grant holders benefits. One of the biggest perks of holding a Moonbird NFT is the access mentioned above to the exclusive PROOF Collective Discord channel. This is an opportunity for new collectors to join discussions and access the coveted private club.

Aside from exclusive Discord access, Moonbirds holders have the opportunity to lock up their NFTs in a process resembling staking. The creators named this locking mechanism Nesting. Once a Moonbird NFT is locked and nesting, it brings its owner additional benefits. Notably, the longer an NFT is nesting, the better the rewards it brings its owner. Moreover, upgraded nests enable enhanced drops and rewards.

As with most things at PROOF, the rewarding mechanics and roadmap for the Moonbirds project are veiled in secrecy. Despite that, the official Moonbirds website emphasizes the lucrative rewards nesting will bring to owners.

Moonbirds with a record-breaking performance in 2 days

10,000 Moonbird NFTs were officially launched on April 16th, a Saturday. While at first sight, there’s nothing impressive about it. However, in the following hours, Moonbirds became one of the top-grossing projects in the history of NFTs, generating over 66,000 ETH in secondary market trading volume within 48 hours.

DappRadar’s NFT Explorer can help you quickly find projects on the rise.

An important detail contributing to the magnitude of trading volume Moonbirds has attracted since launch is the floor price for the collection. The Moonbirds public mint price was 2.5 ETH, while PROOF Collective members minted for free, paying only the gas fees associated with the transaction. This is indeed a relatively high entry price for a 10,000-piece NFT collection.

However, an even more impressive feat was the frenzy the series received in its early days at OpenSea, with prices skyrocketing. On April 16th, the average sale price for a Moonbird NFT was around 10 ETH.

This is a steep increase from the 2.5 ETH mint price and an even steeper revenue generator for PROOF Collective holders who minted for free. More than four months later, the floor price of the Moonbirds series still does not disappoint, currently standing at 13.77 ETH.

Of course, not all Moonbirds sold at floor price either. Looking at the Top Sales on the Moonbirds Single Dapp Page, we can see that some of these NFTs have racked in serious volume for the collection. The top 10 most expensive Moonbirds sales to date all surpass a 100 ETH value, with the most expensive one switching owners for 350 ETH or

$551,607.

Moonbirds vs. CloneX vs. Azuki

Let’s look at some of the other blue-chip projects in the NFT space and put these impressive stats in perspective.

CloneX and Azuki are two of the most traded collections on the market, both gaining popularity in 2022. According to one of the January editions of the New Dapps Report, CloneX managed to generate about $120 million in trading volume in its first week on the secondary market. Remember, Moonbirds has already surpassed that by a significant margin, with $191 million generated in less than 48 hours.

Azuki is another highly-valued project in the NFT space at the moment. According to the third January edition of the New Dapps report, the collection recorded $122 million in trading volume after two weeks of being on the secondary market. Once again, Moonbirds surpassed that volume in a matter of hours.

As you can see, Moonbirds far outperforms big names in the industry only a couple of days after its mint. This is a remarkable performance and sets the bar high for the collection in the future. Additionally, the floor price of Moonbirds still outperforms both CloneX and Azuki.

For a full assessment of Moonbirds, read DappRadar’s in-depth report.

Why is the floor price so high?

In the NFT space, arguably, value is determined by the owners of a given collection. So usually, when a new collection mints, plenty of “flippers” are looking to make a quick buck and get a minimal profit on the recently minted NFTs. However, the case with Moonbirds is far from usual or ordinary.

The more impressive feat was how the community valued their Moonbirds NFTs. The collection had a public mint price of 2.5 ETH, which is relatively high. However, considering the ties to the exclusive PROOF Collective project, the high mint price was somewhat expected. When the collection first hit the market, the floor price was already set at about 8 ETH. This is unprecedented for a collection of this size.

However, mindset and community have a significant role in this record-breaking performance. Collectors looking to get a Moonbird NFT were mostly tempted by the idea of being part of the PROOF Collective.

This is a highly esteemed group of artists and collectors, which requires exclusivity. Often, this exclusivity is achieved based on sufficient wealth. In this sense, an already rich community values its assets much differently than what the general NFT space has seen previously. This inevitably raises curiosity about how these people get rich.

Moonbirds launched Oddities

Moonbirds launched Oddities on the 22nd of May, a collection of 10,000 NFTs. This is a side project from the original Moonbirds team and airdropped to the holders of Moonbirds who “nested” their birds.

Oddities is one of the most popular NFT collections this July, primarily due to its “bloodline” with Moonbirds. The series has accumulated over 11,000 ETH in trading volume. Regarding utility, the team has not yet specified anything concrete for the project. But one thing is for sure, holding Oddities makes you a part of the PROOF Collective ecosystem.

You can read DappRadar’s in-depth report on Oddities for a breakdown of the program.

What’s next for Moonbirds?

Recently, the PROOF team confirmed that the development of a utility token for its community is happening. However, details are scarce for now, and a full reveal of PROOF’s token initiative will occur in Q1 2023.

Moonbirds is an impressive phenomenon revealing that PFP collections can easily rake in millions in volume in a matter of days. All that’s needed is the right kind of backing. DappRadar will continue monitoring both PROOF and the Moonbirds collection, as these are set out to be some of the most traded and top-grossing assets in the NFT space to date.

To keep a close eye on the high-end collections, check out the helpful links below.

Additionally, you can join the DappRadar PRO community to get the most up-to-date sales data for these projects.