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Christie’s Web3 Expert Leaves Auction House to Run CryptoPunks for Yuga Labs
Noah Davis, a key factor in the storied auction house’s crypto embrace, was involved in Beeple’s $69 million NFT sale in March 2021.
By Eli Tan
Updated May 11, 2023, 4:24 p.m. Published Jun 19, 2022, 6:56 p.m.
After acquiring the coveted CryptoPunks non-fungible token (NFT) project back in March, Yuga Labs is bringing on Noah Davis, a key part of the NFT team at auction house Christie’s, to be the project’s brand lead.
Davis announced the move in a Sunday Twitter thread, putting to rest any concerns that the Punks’ future would follow a similar path to the Bored Ape Yacht Club.
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What does that mean? It means no Punks on lunchboxes or cringe TV shows/shitty movies. It means no arbitrary rushed utility or thoughtless airdrops. It means if you love your Punk(s) because they are what they are (just Punks) then you and I see eye to eye…
— noah (@NonFungibleNoah) June 19, 2022
“If you’re a Punk holder and you care about the legacy/future of the brand I wanna talk one on one,” Davis said in the thread. “I’ll be at the Punks Brunch during NFT NYC and will begin scheduling sit-downs immediately. Wherever Punks go, the community will help guide us.”
The announcement more broadly signals a potential resurgence of Punks back into the NFT sphere. Larva Labs, the project’s original creator, has notably done little to boost the project with partnerships or events.
In a separate thread, a Yuga Lab co-founder said commercial rights for the project will be turned over to its owners in the coming weeks.
When we acquired Punks from Larva Labs, there were only two things we knew we wanted to do - the first was to turn over commercial rights to NFT holders similar to how we did for BAYC. The new terms will be rolling out in the next couple weeks.
— Garga.eth (Greg Solano) (@CryptoGarga) June 19, 2022
Insiders possibly knew of the move before it was made public – plenty of collectors have bought up Punks en masse in the days leading up to the announcement, moving the collection’s floor price up to 66.65 ETH (around $69,000) at the time of writing.
Davis was behind Beeple’s famous “The First 5,000 Days” NFT that sold for $69 million at Christie’s in March 2021. He’s also the lead of the Howlerz NFT project, which he will continue to lead while at his new position at Yuga Labs, according to the thread.
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