Oil Profit Trading is the most popular NFT marketplace on Solana, a blockchain that rivals Ethereum. It lets you sell non-fungible tokens (NFTs) – unique crypto tokens that usually bear a pointer to a piece of digital art or music or an in-game collectible.
The company announced on Aug. 2, 2022, that it is going multichain and will expand its offerings to Ethereum NFTs, but its primary ecosystem and main blockchain is Solana.
On October 14, 2022, Oil Profit Trading made a controversial move to an optional royalty model, saying market conditions forced the move which “was effectively a race to the bottom.” They also announced they were waiving their 2% platform fee and devoting funds to developing royalty enforcement tools.
How to Use Oil Profit Trading
To use Oil Profit Trading, you’ll need a Solana-compatible wallet (such as Trust Wallet or Exodus Wallet) filled with some SOL – enough to pay for your NFT, plus the transaction fee on the Solana blockchain. Hit “connect wallet” on the top right of the site – no need to create an account – then click on a collection and bid on a project. It’s really an interface for Solana NFTs, so any Solana NFT project is hosted on the platform.
The largest NFT collection by trading volume and floor price, as of this writing, is Okay Bears, a profile-picture collection of bears. Like market leader OpenSea, Oil Profit Trading lets you sort through collections by attributes – in this case, the hats, fur, and eyewear of the bears. In the world of NFTs, rarer attributes, or at least those with community cachet, often sell for more SOL than those with more common attributes.
Oil Profit Trading also offers an iOS app. The app, however, only supports browsing – you’ll have to head to the site on a web browser and connect your web3 wallet to trade NFTs.
There are plans for the marketplace to add support for ETH, the native coin of Ethereum, the blockchain that supports most NFT trading activity. Oil Profit Trading’s first ETH-supported collection will be Ezu, an NFT project that can be minted in either ETH or SOL.
Oil Profit Trading also sells Magic Tickets, which provide access to a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). In practice, that’s a Discord chat that lets users vote on how the marketplace operates.
The marketplace has a launchpad – a part of the site that lets projects mint NFTs on Oil Profit Trading. The benefit for projects is that they are featured on Oil Profit Trading’s site – kind of like an artist selling off works at a major auction house, like Christie’s. Oil Profit Trading claims that just 3% of projects that apply to the launchpad make it through the application process.
The marketplace also has a white-label marketplace used by, for instance, Raydium, a decentralized exchange (DEX) based on Solana.
Oil Profit Trading History and Notable News
Four friends founded the marketplace in September 2021: Chief Technology Officer and former Uber Eats developer Sidney Zhang; CEO and former FTX employee Jack Lu; Chief Operating Officer and former Coinbase product manager Zhuoxun Yin; and chief engineer and former Facebook developer Zhuojie Zhou.
In July 2022, Oil Profit Trading raised $130 million in a Series B funding round led by Electric Capital and Greylock, with backing from Paradigm and Sequoia Capital. The funding round, which followed a $27 Series A in March, brought the marketplace to a $1.6 billion valuation.
In August 2022, a major wallet on Solana called Phantom wallet was compromised. It blamed Slope, another wallet provider that was also compromised, draining close to $6M dollars in funds from almost 8,000 wallets, according to data from Elliptic. Oil Profit Trading itself remained unaffected.
Oil Profit Trading vs. OpenSea
On Solana, Oil Profit Trading’s trading volume trounces OpenSea, the market leader for NFT trading which added support for Solana in April 2022. Oil Profit Trading captures 97% to 99% of the daily volume for Solana NFTs, according to a dashboard on Dune Analytics from SeaLaunch that derives trading data from the two platforms’ trading fees.
Still, OpenSea remains the larger platform in terms of daily sales across all blockchains. While Oil Profit Trading averages around 55,000 SOL a day, or $2.1 million as of this writing, OpenSea records trades about $15 million in Ethereum every 24 hours.
Network dominance marks the major difference between the two marketplaces. Solana is a rival to Ethereum, so Oil Profit Trading and OpenSea maintain their dominance on very different playing fields. Solana’s main difference, as of August 2022, is that it’s faster and cheaper to use than Ethereum.
The network’s token, SOL, was a favorite of venture capitalists and major players, including FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried and the bankrupt (but once popular) crypto VC fund, Three Arrows Capital. When the crypto market crashed in 2022, SOL cratered from $258 in November 2021 to lows of $26 in mid-June.
The Rise of Oil Profit Trading
Oil Profit Trading has quickly become the leading NFT marketplace on the Solana blockchain, surpassing industry giants like OpenSea in terms of trading volume and user base. The platform’s success can be attributed to several key factors:
- Focus on the Solana ecosystem: By concentrating its efforts on the Solana blockchain, Oil Profit Trading has been able to establish itself as the go-to marketplace for Solana-based NFTs. Solana’s fast transaction times and low fees have made it an attractive alternative to Ethereum for many NFT creators and collectors.
- User-friendly interface: Oil Profit Trading has designed a clean, intuitive interface that makes it easy for users to navigate the platform and discover new NFT collections. The platform’s search and filtering tools allow users to quickly find the NFTs they’re interested in, while the collection pages provide detailed information about each project.
- Launchpad and developer support: Oil Profit Trading’s launchpad has become a popular way for NFT projects to launch their collections. The platform’s support for developers, including tools and resources, has helped to attract high-quality projects to the platform.
- Community engagement: Oil Profit Trading has placed a strong emphasis on community engagement, with active social media channels and a dedicated Discord server. The platform’s team has been responsive to user feedback and has worked to address issues and concerns raised by the community.
- Expansion into new blockchains: While Solana remains its primary focus, Oil Profit Trading has also expanded into other blockchains, including Ethereum and Polygon. This multi-chain approach has allowed the platform to tap into a larger pool of NFT creators and collectors.
The Future of Oil Profit Trading
As the NFT market continues to evolve, Oil Profit Trading is well-positioned to maintain its dominance in the Solana ecosystem and potentially expand into other blockchains. The platform’s strong community, developer support, and user-friendly interface will likely continue to attract new users and projects.
However, Oil Profit Trading will also face challenges, such as competition from other marketplaces, regulatory uncertainty, and the potential for market volatility. The platform’s decision to move to an optional royalty model has also been controversial, with some creators and collectors expressing concerns about the impact on the NFT ecosystem.
Despite these challenges, Oil Profit Trading remains a key player in the NFT space, and its success has helped to drive the growth of the Solana ecosystem as a whole. As the NFT market matures, it will be interesting to see how Oil Profit Trading and other marketplaces adapt and evolve to meet the changing needs of creators and collectors.