Interview with the NFT whale planning to acquire Azuki: I have increased my holdings, NFTs will not die.

On the early morning of June 28th, Azuki, one of the few well-known projects in the NFT field, shocked all NFT players with a jaw-dropping sale. This NFT brand, which is the only one that only rises in price in the bear market, sold 10,000 PFPs that are almost identical to the original Azuki in just 20 minutes for 20,000 ETH, committing several unreasonable mistakes in the NFT industry and causing heavy losses to the community players who believed in Azuki.

BlockBeats interviewed Christian, the founder of NDV Fund and ManesLAB, who is also a major holder of the Azuki series. Currently, he holds 40 Azuki, 700 Beanz, and 400 Azuki Elementals. After the "thunderstorm" incident, Christian once expressed his willingness to offer $40 million to acquire Azuki on social media. This may be a joke, but it also reflects the emotions of the Azuki community, which is angry and helpless.

BlockBeats: Currently, the community must be very dissatisfied. As a major player, are you seriously considering offering $40 million to acquire Azuki, or is it just a joke?

Christian: To be precise, it's half-joking and half-serious. The serious side is that I really have high hopes for the Azuki brand and believe that it has unlimited potential to establish a truly influential fashion brand and cultural benchmark.

This is also why we invested heavily, and roughly calculated, we should have spent several million US dollars on it. Including the Chinese community, there are also many strong and loyal holders. The total position of everyone should far exceed 40 million US dollars, so it is a safe bet to acquire Azuki at this price. I value the strength of the community behind it far more than this number. At the same time, I am confident that we can develop the brand from a pure narrative to a sustainable cash flow entity through practical operation.

The joke is that the price of 40 million dollars is definitely not affordable. I used to trust Zaga and his team very much. They are not the kind of people who would give up such a promising project for a small profit. If they work hard, the annual copyright revenue alone should be more than 10 million US dollars. However, if this FUD handling is not done well, I think it may bury the entire project. Of course, the situation now is a bit unexpected for me. Because this picture and a series of actions afterwards are indeed somewhat unexpected, and the quality is particularly poor. We still want an explanation from the team.

BlockBeats: People outside of the Azuki community may not be aware of how high the community's expectations are for this new product release. Can you share your expectations for this release?

Christian: Looking back now, every step the team took seemed a bit off. First of all, the timing of the launch wasn't great because the sentiment in the NFT market had already hit rock bottom, yet the team still chose to attract liquidity with such a high mint price. I don't think even pricing it at 1 ETH would have caused such a big backlash. But with the price set at 2 ETH this time, it's definitely beyond what most people can understand, so I think many are just gritting their teeth and participating in the sale.

At the same time, this sale is not particularly friendly to the original Azuki Holder, especially for the holder of this Beanz. This is also a sad thing for me because from the image to the cultural attributes of Beanz, I think the potential is very great. However, the team has not made any particularly big moves in the past year. I used to think that they might still be doing something, but this time they directly launched a new product, which seriously infringed on the rights of the old holder.

Before the sale, I also tweeted and expressed my attitude: if Azuki can still release something very different, some practical benefits and progress after this expensive sale, it may boost the entire NFT field. Because I think there are still many funds that are currently watching, but now it seems that this sale is really disappointing, and it has become a meme event, which is actually quite sad.

BlockBeats: Now that Azuki's reputation has hit rock bottom, assuming the acquisition is successful, what are your ideas to save Azuki?

Christian: There are definitely specific ideas that need to be carefully considered and analyzed, but I believe there are a few principles that must be adhered to. First and foremost, it is crucial for NFT projects to break free from the "cutting the community users" dilemma and truly create value from external sources. I have been emphasizing and advocating for this concept for a long time, including my decision to invest in and join the Weirdo Ghost Gang. This is because I can see the team's efforts in expanding their business model, whether it's selling physical merchandise, hosting music festivals, or developing Web3 e-commerce products.

A good IP can theoretically create unlimited value, and these sources of income should drive the continued development of the entire project. I believe that the vast majority of NFT holders sincerely hope to become project shareholders, but so far, I have not seen any project parties with a clear dividend model. Including my previous participation in the Azuki auction, now it seems that the team may still have placed all the target paying users on these community members who sincerely hope to make contributions.

But the true concept of NFT and Web3 should still be to give ownership and distribution rights to users, rather than using it as a guise to "harvest" profits. This is the only way to drive positive development. Azuki previously had the strongest community, including sub-communities such as Red Bean Garden, which had a large number of talented individuals. Despite not receiving any money, everyone still worked for the brand and the communities they loved, which makes me feel quite unfair for them.

I think NFT projects must break out of the vicious circle of extracting value infinitely from holders, including decentralizing rights to communities in various regions, so that they can receive support and benefit distribution, and better spread and develop the brand. Of course, this is easy to say, but it is still difficult to manage. But if I think there are fresh narratives worth exploring in this field, this is a direction I would choose to develop.

BlockBeats: Previously, you mentioned that if it didn't meet expectations, you would sell all. Are you not planning to sell the Azuki series now?

Christian: I currently have no plans to sell, because objectively speaking, the sentiment is already very poor. Unless the team does something more irreversible, the rebound should be fast. Selling at this time would cause huge losses, both for me personally and for the entire project and community. Instead, I have started to slowly buy in, and today I bought more than 200 Beanz. If I end up losing, I accept it. It's just for the love of something I once loved, and for the experience of participating and building a community with so many people.

BlockBeats: The next question will be more macroscopic. We briefly discussed this in the previous interview. Compared to other blue chips, why do you prefer Azuki?

Christian: First of all, the overall brand tone is good and the narrative space is large, which is definitely its biggest advantage. However, at present, if it only relies on these, it is definitely unable to become a long-term brand.

Setting aside all of that, there is only one reason why I truly believe in Azuki. Even when it fell to 6 ETH, I didn't sell a single one. Up until now, I have never sold any and have only continued to add to my position. The sole reason for this is because I deeply understand the immense power of its community, which is the foundation of its success.

Although I lost money today, I didn't feel particularly upset. Instead, I felt quite relieved. However, when I think about it, it's very sad that a community that was originally so stable has had its confidence fundamentally shaken. Price is only a short-term feedback based on emotions, but once the fundamentals change, trends will emerge. Therefore, I hope the team can come out with a reasonable explanation as soon as possible to stabilize everyone's confidence.

BlockBeats: It seems that all the blue-chip NFTs with teams have died out, but meme communities like Punk and Milady are thriving. Where do you think the value of blue-chip NFTs lies?

Christian: To be honest, I think the value of blue-chip NFTs lies in the realm of imagination. Examples like MoonBirds and Doodles have shown us that even if the project team is excellent and the project's market value is huge, and there are many "powerful players" in the community, if the team does not continue to develop or the narrative stops, they cannot stop the decline trend.

Except for BAYC, Azuki is the only blue-chip project that I consider valuable so far. Only a project that establishes a stable cash flow in the future and can give back to the community will truly become the value of NFT. Today, I still haven't seen such a project, and I look forward to more visionary and responsible founders stepping forward to do this. The little ghost Weirdo Ghost Gang is also silently working in this direction, but it definitely has a big gap compared to Azuki because it did not have the ability to promote it widely before. Of course, if you want to do culture and brand solidly, it is definitely not a matter of one day.

I think Crypto needs a more realistic business model, whether it's NFT or homogeneous tokens. Of course, the most interesting thing is this kind of tension. Because in the Crypto field, once a narrative business model is too clear, such as DeFi now, their valuation actually has a ceiling, so capable teams should make a more perfect combination of the two aspects.

BlockBeats: Will the market and valuation of the NFTfi track be affected by the current performance of blue-chip NFTs?

Christian: This is for sure. No matter how much infrastructure and derivative applications there are, there needs to be a core asset leading the market forward. A project with strong influence can only be completed by this project. PFP used to be the leader, but the future is uncertain. I believe that a top project will emerge, but today's Azuki has shattered everyone's original fantasy. At this point, I can only say to myself, "How much worse can it get?" I still firmly believe in the NFT field, and I have also invested in NFT projects such as Paraspace. Emotionally, I think today is a severe blow to the NFT industry, but rationally, I believe that the future is still bright.

BlockBeats: Many projects are trying sustainable profit models, such as Nike's Swoosh and Little Ghost's CutUP. What is the correct way for NFT projects to achieve sustainable profitability?

Christian: You don't need a particularly innovative approach, just doing a good job with the physical products around the entity and connecting the entire supply chain is already great, with huge profit margins. Although CutUP, the little ghost, doesn't have much publicity, its previous release did make people outside the circle start to understand this brand. Previously, non-holders and non-Web3 industry professionals would buy branded clothing, which I think is a good prospect. Another advantage of Web3 projects is establishing projects online, not to mention e-commerce, and in the future, they can even be combined with DeFi, which are all good attempts.

BlockBeats: Is there still a narrative for blue-chip NFTs? Will the next cycle still be related to avatar NFTs?

Christian: I don't think avatar NFTs will die, but it's obvious to everyone that the narrative of blue-chip NFTs can no longer rely solely on images.

You can think about it from this perspective. At that time, BAYC actually created a miracle in the history of business. They made a project worth $5 billion in just one year from scratch. And this was achieved purely through community consensus and hype. At that time, many BAYC holders were among the most influential people in the world, including Curry, Eminem, Doge, Neymar, and others. But even with such a powerful lineup, BAYC's market value at the time was only stuck at $5 billion.

So I think this issue is similar to discussing the essence of the entire DeFi industry. It seems that there will be certain bottlenecks, and the high Ponzi yield model relying on continuous capital injection will eventually come to an end. After the illusion is shattered, there will definitely be a significant pullback and more contemplation. Whoever can grasp this contemplation after the industry experiences a low point and re-explore which real business models can be validated will be able to gain a certain advantage in the next trend.

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