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Introduction

Introduction to cryptopunks

One of the earliest NFTs on the ethereum blockchain, so early that there were no provision for NFT (ERC-721) yet  and were instead an inspiration for the ERC-721 standard that powers most digital art and collectibles. The CryptoPunks are 10,000 uniquely generated characters. No two are exactly alike, and each one of them can be officially owned by a single person on the Ethereum blockchain. Originally, they could be claimed for free by anybody with an Ethereum wallet, but all 10,000 were quickly claimed. Now they must be purchased from someone via the marketplace that's also embedded in the blockchain.

Our aim would be to know who the top wallets are in terms of the sheer amount of eth made by them during sales or by the amount of NFTs they hold.

Reference -

Objective - What are we looking at ?

In this article, we look at who have been the most successful cryptopunk traders in terms of both money and number of cryptopunks.

Glossary

flip - sale within a day

short - sale within 30 days

medium - sale between 30 days and 180 days

long - sale after 6 months

Table of contents

1. Introduction
2. Objective - What are we looking at?
3. Glossary
4. Methodology - How did i do it?
5. Analysis
6. Article in 10 sentences
7. Reference

Methodology - How did i do it ?

In order to detect sales, we use the facts events table where the buyer address , seller address and the value of eth is extracted from event inputs. We chose to use the fact events table instead of the nft sale table because of the uniqueness of cryptopunks project. While they are technically NFTs, they are not ERC 721 completely . Only 500 odd Tokens have been wrapped into ERC-721. Hence we use the fact events table.

Note :

1. All values are in ETH and not in USD. (unless specified)
2. We ignore the wrapped cryptopunks for this analysis. because of thier low numbers (~500 NFTs)
3. Punks and cryptopunks are the same in this article

We only conisder the following method ids.

'0x8264fe98' - buy punk,
'0x9a2b8115' - batch buy,
'0xc9836773' - buy using private transaction,
'0xa9711b7e' - buy using private transaction.

To identify the current holders we use qualify (row_number() over (partition by punk order by block_timestamp desc))=1

To segregate the user type, we use the user type as

• when balance < 1 and balance > 0 then 'shrimp (0-1)'
• when balance < 10 and balance >= 1 then 'crab (1-10)'
• when balance < 50 and balance >= 10 then 'Octpus (10-50)'
• when balance < 100 and balance >= 50 then 'Fish (50-100)'
• when balance < 500 and balance >= 100 then 'Dolphins (100-500)'
• when balance < 1000 and balance >= 500 then ' Shark (500-1000)'
• when balance < 5000 and balance >= 1000 then ' Whale (1000-5000)'
• when balance >= 5000 then 'Humpback whale (5000+)'

We distinguish between types of trades as

case 
  when time_diff < 2 then 'flip'
  when time_diff between 2 and 30 then 'short'
  when time_diff between 30 and 180 then ' medium'
  when time_diff >180 then 'long'

Analysis

1. Metrics
2. Top 10 trade info
3. Top holders and their analysis
4. Top profiteers and analysis
5. Analysis of sales
6. Trend analysis of sales
7. Punk analysis

Metrics

Let’s first crunch some numbers. We start with looking at the metrics of the cryptopunk system, namely the number of sales, the total volume generated and the average amount.

==A total of 5870 sales have occurred while generating a revenue of 0.87 Million in sales.==

Are we on the right track ?

Comparing with the official numbers

We now compare our results with the official numbers. The official stats can be found on .

The webpage says that The average sale price of a punk over the last year is 205.32 ETH ($320,949.60 USD). The total value of punks sold over the last year is 416,953.87 ETH ($651,753,097.65 USD) and that there have been a total of 22.3 k sales.

While the ==official number of sales is quoted as 22k, we could identify a total of 20.1k sale==s which is close.

However,coming to the total volume, ==the Total volume of sales in the past year was 416k ETH according to official numbers and so does our analysis.==

Because of this, we can clearly say that we are on the right path.

Top 10 trade info

We now identify the top 10 costliest buys.

We identify the punk #5822 wearing a bandana and looking cool af alien, to be the highest, being sold for a whooping 8000 ethereum on Feb 12 2022. while the second costliest being punk #7804, costing 4200 Eth on 11 march 2021. 7.57 Million USD for a smokey dude :cry: ?

Surprisingly, ==3 of the top 10 sales are of punks wearing a blue bandana.== (Though 4156 is twice among the top 10). Do cool guys wear a bandana ?

Adding on 5822 is an alien with bandana, 7804 is a smoking alien, 3100 is an alien with headband. ==Geez, aliens are pricey.==

Additionally, 4156 is an ape with bandana, 5577 is an ape with cowboy hat, 4464 is an ape and so is 5217 and 2140. Well, ==apes are costly too== (not as much as aliens, but man they are costly than humans :laughing:)

==Comparing our results to the official source, we see that our analysis has correctly identified all the top 10 trades.==

Top holders

Now, back to the question.

Which 10 wallets are the most successful Cryptopunk traders in terms of number of punks held.

Analysis of top holders

100+ punks in a single address ?

Hell yeah, ==We notice that the holders== 0x1919db36ca2fa2e15f9000fd9cdc2edcf863e685 ==and==

0x650dcdeb6ecf05ae3caf30a70966e2f395d5e9e5 ==are the top 2 holders while holding close to 100+ NFTs.==

Want to know another interesting fact ?

0x1919db36ca2fa2e15f9000fd9cdc2edcf863e685 is a huge whale with close to 1M USD in eth while 0x650dcdeb6ecf05ae3caf30a70966e2f395d5e9e5 has close to 10000 USD in eth alone.

So yeah, whales do hold a lot of punks.

Looks like i already gave a spoiler in the previous section. Well, let’s still look at the graph and see some new trends.

Alright, Now that we know who the top holders are. What type of users are they ?

Do pay attention to the graph on the left, as the y axis is in log scale to make things appear (like actually visible). It appears that the top 4 holders are all humpback whales (5000+ eth) while only 2 are fish.

No shrimps and crabs :cry:.

On looking at the distribution of top 100 users, we find that ==45 % of the top holders are humpback while 20% are whales. Only a minute 7 % are crabs and fish.==

Top profiteers

We now march on to the second part of the question. Which 10 wallets are the most successful Cryptopunk traders based on profits generated.

In the above graph, we see who the top profiteers are.

We now strive to breakdown on what kind of trades they do. Are the long term investors, short term or flippers. What kind do they prefer.?

Well, that’s interesting.

The opinion among the top 10 is split. While the top 1 and 2 usually go for a long term investment or sale, the top 3,4 and 6 prefer for a more short term aspect. they usually go for a sale within a month of buying and then take profits.

The most profitable among them is 0x1919db36ca2fa2e15f9000fd9cdc2edcf863e685. Sounds familiar, he/she is the one with 1 Million USD in eth. a huge whale.

Analysis of sales

Analysis of long short trend

Did i just put in too many graphs here. yeah kind of, if i cant explain them.

Here’s a short note on all graphs.

The ==average profit made on a sale is much higher for sales that were long== ( > 180 days since buy) an average of 35 eth while flips only yielded an average profit if 5 eth. Something to think about. When we see the number of transactions too, the majority of the sales were of long ones. that is held for more than 180 days. Only a meagre ==5 % of them are flips.==

Among the top 5 most profitable + top 5 most loss sales, all of them were either a long or medium. with long ones predominantly profitable.

Punk analysis

What are the top punks ? or in other words, If i were to flip, what would i flip on ?

To give a data backed answer, we look at the graph. For this one would look at the average profit a punk has given to date.

==Punks 7804 and 3100 have given the best returns to its users.== Both have given the sellers an average of 4000+ eth in return. much higher than the rest.

7804 is a rare alien punk who smokes. ( The smokey dude from before) while 3100 is also an alien (not a smokey dude) who wears a headband.

So, in short, aliens are hot.

The leftmost graph tells us one thing. There are a few punks that have been traded a lot, like a lot when compared to rest. The punks 3914 and 9322 have been traded the highest number of times. ( close to 15 times).

3914 is a male punk with mole and a cowboy hat while 9322 is again a male punk but with cap, beard and an eye patch (aye). 8970 is male punk too

==So, it seems the male punks aren’t considered as collectables.==

Article in 10 sentence

A total of 20k sales have taken place generating a volume of 0.8 Million eth in the process. the Total volume of sales in the past year was 416k ETH according to official numbers and so does our analysis. Aliens and apes are costlier than normal one due to their rarity. Bandana users are cool and have sold for higher prices. The top holders are usually whales (65%), with two of them 0x1919db36ca2fa2e15f9000fd9cdc2edcf863e685 and 0x650dcdeb6ecf05ae3caf30a70966e2f395d5e9e5 each holding 100+. Around 45 % of the top holders are humpback-whales, 20 % whales and the rest made of sharks, dolphins and other species. The opinion among the top 10 is split. While the top 1 and 2 usually go for a long term investment or sale, the top 3,4 and 6 prefer for a more short term aspect. The average profit made on a sale is much higher for sales that were long. Only 5 % of the sales are made by flippers. We notice that long positions are usually sold in the bear market and flipping increases in the bull market. Alien punks have given the best profits till now, averaging around 4000+eth . However, they are not the most traded, it’s the male punks which are quite abundant that are listed very often.

The most important dates to follow in top graphs are

• october , november of 2018,

• March of 2020 (Crash because of covid fears)

• May of 2022 ( crash because of terra).

  During the above time periods, we notice that the long positions are usually sold off during these time. That is, long position are more likely to be sold during the start of bull market or in times of market volatility.

Adding on, During 2021 where the market sentiment was positive, the number of flippings and short trades increased.

Hence, ==We notice that long positions are usually sold in the bear market and flipping increases in the bull market.==