The team behind nonfungible token collection OnChainMonkey is shifting its entire collection of 10,000 NFTs from Ethereum to Bitcoin, in a massive undertaking expected to take several months.
“A historical transition is on the horizon as we prepare to migrate our flagship collection, OCM Genesis, from Ethereum to Bitcoin,” Metagood co-founder and CEO Danny Yang said in a statement on Sept. 7.
The OnChainMonkeys were first launched in September 2021 on Ethereum, but Yang said the migration to Bitcoin Ordinals was due to its community seeing Bitcoin as offering a more secure platform for its users.
“The Bitcoin Ordinal protocol is better designed for decentralization and security than the Ethereum NFT protocol. High-value NFTs will win on Bitcoin.”
The proposal to migrate to Bitcoin was passed by 99% of OnChainMonkey tokenholders. Yang said this means the community had a high conviction for moving to Bitcoin.
The migration would come at a hefty cost though, with Metagood expecting to fork out over $1 million to ensure the migration process runs smoothly.
Why is the Art and Collectibles market significant for Bitcoin? Why should this matter to you?
1. Valuable Market. The wealth associated from art and collectibles by ultra-high net worth individuals (UHNWIs) *alone* accounts for $1.5 TRILLION in value according to Deloitte’s…
— danny huuep (@huuep) August 22, 2023
While the migration process is rather complex, each new OnChainMonkey on Bitcoin will have clear provenance to the corresponding original Ethereum NFT. Holders will receive the corresponding Bitcoin Ordinal once they’ve burned the Ethereum NFT.
However, Yang says the migration shouldn’t be too challenging compared to what Metagood has already accomplished in the Bitcoin Ordinals space:
“We were the first to inscribe 10,000 images of a collection on Bitcoin. We were the first to launch a parent-child collection with OCM Dimensions 300. We pioneered recursive inscriptions on Bitcoin, as well as inscribing Three.js and p5.js for everyone to use.”
However, Ethereum continues to dominate the NFT market, settling $236.8 million in NFTs over the last month, compared to second place Solana ($37.7 million), with Bitcoin ($11.1 million) back in sixth place, according to CryptoSlam.
At the same time, Bitcoin Ordinals transaction volumes plunged 98% between May and mid-August despite rising to popularity in early 2023.
Bitcoin Ordinals is dead.
Bitcoin is dead. We heard this many many times over the years. In the case of Bitcoin Ordinals, let’s actually understand what actually is dead.
1. Bitcoin Ordinals is a new protocol at release 0.8.2. It’s an early release of a protocol that still… https://t.co/NxJP7YY64y
— danny huuep (@huuep) August 19, 2023
But Yang isn’t concerned, highlighting to Cointelegraph that it is only time before a strong Bitcoin-native NFT ecosystem develops. Both Bitcoin and Ethereum NFT ecosystems can thrive, he added.
Related: Ordinals still make up majority of Bitcoin txs despite price collapse
OnChainMonkey NFTs currently trade at an average floor price of 1.10 Ether (ETH) with over 20,550 ETH in transaction volume from 9,500 items since it launched on NFT marketplace OpenSea in September 2021.
Of the 2,900 owners of the OnChainMonkey NFTs, 31% are unique owners, according to OpenSea.
The arrival of Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens launched in January, which were made possible by the Taproot soft fork executed in November 2021.
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