$56M CryptoPunk Sale May Not Be What It Seems

posted  20 hr ago
A recent sale of a $56M CryptoPunk became a hot topic for discussions not only for the high price but for the nature of the transaction. There can be more behind the transaction for CryptoPunk #1563, the blockchain community was quick to spot.

What seemed suspicious was that the buyer used a flash loan to pay the sum. The thing is that with flash loans, users can borrow assets and pay them back in the same block. 

Blockchain auditor and Solidity developer @0xQuit wrote on X that it could seem that the NFT was sold, but actually, it moved between wallets without real payment happening.

So, the NFT buyer borrowed $24,000 in Ethers from Balancer and transferred it to the seller. This way, the buyer holds the NFT, while the seller returns ETHs to Balancer.

These types of transactions can be held to raise public interest and artificially increase the price of an asset. In its analytics, @0xQuit also noted that a buyer’s wallet holds a newly minted Kamala Harris memecoin, with an upcoming open presale  in a week.

By hyping CryptoPunk #1563, the persons behind the memecoin assumably could raise funds and pay the developer.