The Rise and Fall of GameStop’s NFT Marketplace

GameStop has given up on NFTs.

Lower than three years after first hinting at its curiosity in NFTs, GameStop has ditched its NFT market. As introduced in January, the platform is not purposeful for getting and promoting belongings as of February 2, although it’s nonetheless viewable on-line.

The sport retailer, which started as a U.S.-based brick-and-mortar operation again in 1984, has lately struggled to keep up a worthwhile enterprise. GameStop was worthwhile for the primary time in years in late 2022, however this adopted company-wide layoffs and a company exit from some European nations.

GameStop retains pivoting, and the newest sufferer of these strikes is its NFT market. Right here’s a glance into the rise—and fall—of GameStop’s NFT plans.

April 2021: GameStop seeks a blockchain analyst

Again in April 2021, a GameStop job itemizing for a blockchain safety analyst instructed that the retailer was planning an NFT push. A fintech recruiter informed Decrypt on the time that it was seemingly that GameStop was planning to launch one thing “critical” within the crypto house due to the job itemizing’s safety focus.

Might 2021: GameStop launches mysterious website

In Might 2021, GameStop shared through a minimalistic touchdown web page that it was persevering with to rent staff for its blockchain challenge. On the time, it was unclear if the retailer would launch an NFT assortment, a token, a market, or one thing else fully. 

This touchdown web page contained quite a few hints and Easter eggs, although, like a hyperlink to a GameStop Ethereum good contract that had acquired an NFT from Immutable’s Gods Unchained card recreation. The teaser website additionally had an “countless runner” browser recreation hidden inside it.

January 2022: Blockchain division revealed

By January 2022, GameStop had established its blockchain division and employed 20 staff to work on its then-upcoming crypto plans. GameStop’s inventory surged 31% after the information broke.

February 2022: Immutable deal + $100 million fund

GameStop introduced its $100 million grant fund with crypto startup Immutable in February 2022, providing disbursements of Immutable’s IMX token to builders wanting to make use of the Immutable X blockchain and launch their NFTs with GameStop. 

This information additionally confirmed that GameStop would use the Immutable X blockchain for its then-upcoming NFT market (GameStop’s market additionally makes use of Loopring, one other Ethereum scaling community).

The retailer had, up till this level, remained very quiet about its blockchain plans. 

February 2022: GameStop sells off $47 million price of IMX

In a considerably awkward flip of occasions, GameStop plunged IMX’s value 23% in 24 hours because it offered off a staggering $47 million price of IMX tokens. Whereas the token disbursement was a part of a prearranged deal, outsiders might view this as GameStop seeking to money out instantly and take income on its crypto partnerships—earlier than even launching a single crypto product.

Might 2022: GameStop NFT Twitter and pockets launch

GameStop spun up a GameStop NFT Twitter account devoted to selling its NFT plans.

“What the web did for communication, blockchains do for worth,” GameStop’s NFT account wrote in Might 2022. “Public, permissionless, credibly impartial worth layers [give] energy to the gamers,” it added, espousing crypto’s potential advantages. 

Right now, nonetheless, NFT gross sales had hit a plateau.

GameStop additionally launched its browser extension crypto and NFT pockets in Might 2022, and tweeted about its many alternative pockets patch updates all year long.

July 2022: Market launch—and layoffs

In July 2022, GameStop ditched its CFO and laid off employees throughout its companies, one month after reporting substantial losses. Days later, it launched its anticipated NFT market in beta, which required NFT creators to submit purposes for approval to be listed or host mints on its platform. 

GameStop’s NFT market additionally doesn’t supply any knowledge transparency past the stats for its prime 50 most-traded collections. {The marketplace} noticed over 3,100 Ethereum price of NFTs traded inside its first two days of launch, which was about $3.5 million on the time. Whereas this wasn’t a lot in comparison with the biggest NFT marketplaces like OpenSea, GameStop surpassed Coinbase’s NFT market effort.  

The sport retailer continued to encourage builders to use to its $100 million grant program throughout this time.

October 2022: GameStop lastly provides gaming NFTs

Three months after launching its NFT market, GameStop lastly added Immutable X gaming NFTs to its platform. Because of this NFT gadgets or belongings from video games like Gods Unchained, Illuvium, and Guild of Guardians could possibly be purchased and offered through GameStop’s NFT market. Till this level, the retailer had solely supplied profile picture-style NFTs and artwork NFTs on the market on its platform.

In November 2022, GameStop furthered its crypto and NFT pockets push by releasing a model for iOS cell gadgets through Apple’s App Retailer, in keeping with a U.S. Securities and Change Fee (SEC) submitting.

March 2023: SEC submitting suggests minimal impression

“Our new digital asset services and products could not obtain our desired outcomes and will expose us to new dangers,” GameStop wrote in an SEC submitting in March 2023 of its danger evaluation of its blockchain push. 

“If and to the extent we’re unable to efficiently implement and function these digital belongings initiatives, we could incur unanticipated prices and losses, and face different hostile penalties, akin to unfavourable reputational results,” the corporate continued. 

GameStop additional expressed that its blockchain choices subjected the corporate to dangers “much like these related to any new product choices, together with, however not restricted to, our means to precisely anticipate market demand and acceptance, creator and purchaser acceptance, technical points with the operation of the merchandise, and authorized and regulatory dangers,” per the submitting.

June 2023: GameStop fires CEO

Uh oh—GameStop fired the CEO that led the corporate’s push into blockchain and NFTs inside a yr of its NFT market launch.

August 2023: GameStop axes crypto pockets

In August 2023, GameStop quietly shared that it was discontinuing its crypto pockets in November as a result of “regulatory uncertainty of the crypto house” through a pop-up message on its NFT market’s web site. 

Round this time, high-profile crypto lawsuits with the SEC remained ongoing at exchanges like Coinbase and Binance.

September 2023: NFT Twitter account goes quiet

GameStop’s NFT-focused Twitter account—which promoted artists and collections authorized for its NFT market—stopped posting on its primary Twitter feed. The account has continued to sporadically reply to some customers till December 2023, nonetheless.

It’s unclear whether or not employees in control of the account have been laid off, reassigned to a special position, or had been merely informed to cease posting “gm” and the like on the account.

November 2023: GameStop pockets discontinued

GameStop gave its crypto pockets customers about three months to maneuver their belongings off its product earlier than it shut down in November. The pockets had been initially launched for each Chrome browsers and iOS.

December 2023: Minimal earnings from NFTs

In December, GameStop’s quarterly earnings report revealed that the corporate earned $2.8 million from promoting digital belongings—the time period it makes use of to seek advice from NFTs—from January till late October in 2023. That’s a far cry from the $77.4 million in digital asset gross sales it reportedly noticed over the identical interval in 2022. 

Total, GameStop operated at a internet lack of $56.4 million throughout that very same interval, per the report.  

February 2024: GameStop NFT market closes

By January, GameStop had made its intentions clear: its NFT market can be shutting down. Once more, nonetheless, the publicly-traded firm saved largely quiet about its plans to shut the NFT platform, opting once more to convey the information by way of a small pop-up message on the NFT web site.

On February 2, as deliberate, {the marketplace} lower all buying and selling performance, which means you’ll be able to nonetheless view belongings on the platform however cannot really purchase or promote them. Any NFTs purchased or offered beforehand through the platform stay on the respective blockchain in query, and could be accessed and/or traded by way of different means.

GameStop’s crypto push got here at a time the place the corporate was struggling to show a revenue. And if the corporate’s earnings reviews are any indication, NFTs didn’t precisely remedy that drawback.

Edited by Andrew Hayward

Editor’s observe: This story was initially posted on January 15 and final up to date with new data by Andrew Hayward on February 4.