What is NFT? How non-fungible tokens work and how you can buy them; There's no shame in still not knowing what they are.
Byline: By, Sian Bradley
At the start of 2021, only hardcore crypto fans knew what NFTs were.
At the close of the year, market data showed that nearly $41bn had been spent on the digital artworks and collectables.
The industry has proven divisive; some preach their potential to revolutionise the art world, others are more cynical.
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There are also regulatory issues. A bug in OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, has let hackers buy NFTs for well below their market value, sometimes making hundreds of thousands of dollars in profit.
At least $1 million worth of NFTs were 'stolen' in just 12-hours, leading to massive financial losses for the creators, according to blockchain analysis company Elliptic.
The Verge noticed that the 'hack' was referenced weeks ago on Twitter this but exploitation of it picked up this week.
The flaw let users access old listings, so they could buy the NFTs at its original, cheaper price.
Under this loophole, one of the Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT's, number 9991 to be exact, was purchased for 0.77 ETH $1,760 and resold for 84.2 ETH $192,400. That's a profit of $190,000.
This isn't the first slip up that has affected the Bored Ape Yacht Club, a prestigious collection of more than 10,000 NFTs.
At the end of last year, user Maxnaut was meant to list his Bored Ape for 75 ether, or around $300,000.
Instead he accidentally listed it for 0.75 ether, which is just $3,066. That's one hundredth of the intended price, for a 'fat finger' error -a human rather than technical mistake.
Despite the risks involved, the Bored Apes have spearheaded the NFT phenomenon.
Celebrities are splurging hundreds of thousands on images of cartoon apes, with Jimmy Fallon, Steph Curry, Post Malone and Eminem owning their own.
The one bought by Eminem, for around $450,000 £334,000, was made to look slightly like him with a cap and gold chain.
NFTs have been gaining popularity for more than a year now, with well-known content creators Logan Paul and Addison Rae throwing their support in with the more hardcore techhie fans.
From CryptoPunks to pet rocks, it was the biggest crypto story of 2021, and the bubble hasn't burst yet as game publishers have tried to muscle in on the action.
If you still don't really understand what NFTs are, we break it all down below.
What are NFTs
NFTs stands for non-fungible tokens -not that this makes it any clearer.
In economics, fungible basically means it is interchangeable. So...
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