The Bored Ape Yacht Club nonfungible-token collection on the OpenSea marketplace earlier this year.
Photo:
Tiffany Hagler-Geard/Bloomberg News
OpenSea, one of the largest marketplaces for nonfungible tokens, said Thursday it would cut a fifth of its staff as the crash in cryptocurrency prices continued to wreak havoc on digital-asset firms.
Chief Executive
Devin Finzer
said in an internal memo to employees that he shared on Twitter that the company would provide severance and healthcare coverage into 2023, as well as accelerated equity vesting, for those laid off.
The company said it now has 230 employees, suggesting about 57 people were laid off.
Investors have been selling off their most-speculative assets as the Federal Reserve has moved away from its easy-money policies. The cryptocurrency market value is now under $1 trillion, a significant drop from its nearly $3 trillion value in late 2021, according to CoinMarketCap.
OpenSea has suffered from a declining user base in the midst of the continuing crypto winter. In June, the Justice Department charged a former employee with fraud and money laundering in what prosecutors said was the first case to involve insider trading of digital tokens.
OpenSea’s announcement is part of a wave of layoffs at crypto firms. The biggest U.S. cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase Global Inc., reduced its staff by 18% in mid-June, portending a further downturn among its peers. Shares of the company are down nearly 79% through this year.
The NFT market hit a high in January with $16.6 billion in monthly volume, a rapid rise from its more than $350 million in July 2021, according to data firm the Block. Activity has fallen precipitously since then, down to about $1 billion in June.
Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, briefly fell below $18,000 last month, a deep pricecut from its high of near $69,000 in November 2021. On Thursday afternoon, bitcoin traded at $20,659.92.
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Appeared in the July 15, 2022, print edition as ‘NFT Marketplace OpenSea Cuts Fifth of Staff.’
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