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Dialogue with Whale Shark: NFT Investment Philosophy of OG Collectors

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We are in the midst of the NFT frenzy, and what excites Whale Shark right now is witnessing the medium of NFT being accepted by more and more mainstream.

Original source: SuperRare

Original author: Harmon Leon

Original editor: Sleepy

< p>Whale Shark is one of the most mythical figures in the entire encrypted art world. He is a legendary collector, and his collections are among the top in the world in terms of scale and value. Whale Shark is moving forward steadily, looking for high-quality investment targets very carefully, and selecting artists based on his taste for the most popular NFTs.

Whale Shark is a peaceful giant whale, silently observing its prey.

However, no one knows who the mysterious Whale Shark really is. In every previous interview, Whale Shark has used a head portrait that looks like a steampunk version of Monopoly. His Twitter bio simply reads "I am a collector of all things cutting edge and rare."

Whale Shark official website article The profile tells the details of his life to everyone. He is one of the main collectors of respected NFT artists such as Pak, XCOPY and Hackatao, with a total of 220,000 NFTs in his collection.

He is mysterious and humble. He said: "I am very lucky to be able to choose these artists and grow up with them."

Among people's speculation, Whale Shark's real identity is a cryptocurrency tycoon from the UK who now lives in Hong Kong. Buy Bitcoin with half of your monthly salary, then sell all your Bitcoin holdings for Ethereum in 2015.

"trends HARD" by XCOPY in Whale Vault

In 2019, a big event happened. Whale Shark entered the NFT world and found that he has an extremely keen insight into encrypted art. This is very interesting and intriguing , You know, he has never collected any traditional art works.

"The first piece of art I collected was NFT." He said, "I can collect it anonymously, without thinking too much, just collecting Something I like. The first NFT I bought was from a game called "Gods Unchained." Since then, the door to a new world has opened, and Whale Shark has started collecting NFT artwork on SuperRare.

In May 2020, Whale Shark created the WHALE Vault community, which is a DAO, about There are 20,000 active members.

From WHALE Vault official website

Okay, now that the background story is over, let's go deeper, Get to know this mysterious man full of mystery, learn about his vision and dreams, and listen to him talk about the future prospects of NFT and how to invest.

Break into the mainstream NFT

In his residence in Hong Kong, Whale Shark linked into the Zoom conference room, of course, we interviewed by voice, Whale Shark said the first sentence The words were: "Bro, let's get started."

“I have always believed that NFT is a natural evolution of digital assets.” He said, “Before the birth of NFT, digital art did not receive the attention it deserved. "

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WHALE Collections in Vault

Whale Shark believes that we are in the frenzy of NFT, and what excites him most now is to witness the medium of NFT being accepted by more and more mainstream accept.

“Now the mainstream layout of NFT surprised me. Even Sotheby’s, Christie’s or Leading auction houses such as China Poly Auction have started to auction NFT, which shows that they think this is the future development direction of digital art." - Whale Shark

Whale Shark's Investment Philosophy

Speaking of which, you may wonder what a person who has collected 220,000 NFT collections pays special attention to when investing? Whale Shark said: "I have an investment matrix, and I will use this matrix to evaluate. First I will focus on the team. I will look at their background, experience, who is following. Then I will try to find out in the real world. Is there a case with a similar trajectory to that.”

The third thing Whale Shark pays attention to is the quality of the collection.

Typographic Data City: Paris by Brendan Dawes in Whale Vault

Whale Shark said: "Some NFTs are very well designed, skillful, and beautiful."

As an individual artist, Whale Shark prefers to invest in styles he likes. "Collecting art is a very personal thing," he said. "I do like collecting minimalist work, things like generative art and vaporwave. I value the quality of the work and hope that in the work Discover the unique qualities of an artist."

Whale Shark pointed out that some artists understand NFT too simply. He said: "NFT is not as simple as taking a photo of your physical work, but I do see that many traditional artists are seriously thinking about how to convert their physical works into digital works, which is surprising."

Whale in the vault The Last Son of Krypton Fights for Humankind by José Delbo

Finally, Whale Shark will pay attention to the artist’s social media, and will pay attention to whether they have many fans, His reasoning is that “if you buy an NFT that doesn’t have mainstream appeal, then from an investment perspective — it’s not liquid.”

Will the NFT bubble burst?

Whale Shark once predicted that 99% of current NFT projects will eventually fail. It is precisely because of this that he tends to look for projects with long-term vitality that can cross bears and bulls.

"The current projects are like a torrential river," he said, "so those investors with small capital often choose to fast in and fast out. "Whale Shark feels that the NFT bubble burst once in May. He also feels that many NFTs that people invest in are "the emperor's new clothes."

“When I first saw these avatar projects, I thought they were Beanie Babies,” asserts Whale Shark, “I do think that the current NFT The avatar craze was short-lived."

What he worries about getting people to invest in avatar projects like Bored Ape or CryptoPunks is that "people can make a lot of money in a very short period of time trading these avatars." Money. But in the long run, especially when NFTs go mainstream, will they still pay $1 million, $2 million for a picture?"

A "whale" community

What's more interesting is that after determining the direction of post-NFT investment, Whale Shark will not act alone, he will lead his DAO to act together, because He knows the truth that there is strength in numbers.

“I am proud that the Whale Community DAO is the first DAO where assets of this size can be managed by community members. It improves the quality of decision making because people Vote on whether to buy or sell." - Whale Shark

Its 20,000-member WHALE community watches the market and focuses on certain creators to determine whether a piece of crypto art has mass appeal force.

At the end of our chat, Whale Shark made a Zen-filled summary: "Collective wisdom will definitely be higher than individual wisdom."

Just like that, Whale Shark left the Zoom meeting room, his voice still lingering in my ears, like a whale singing in the sea.