The recent crypto price crash has wiped out billions of dollars in value of all digital assets, and non-fungible tokens are no exception, according to a recent study.
Over the past six months, the price of both NFT collections and NFT coins plunged, causing many NFT buyers to vanish from marketplaces. Still, the revenues of NFT marketplaces continued rising.
Data presented by CryptoPresales.com showed that revenues of NFT marketplaces are expected to hit $2.5 bln by the end of 2022, a massive 60% increase year-over-year.
Revenues surge despite crypto crash
NFT marketplaces make their revenue from charging transaction fees. For example, the world’s largest NFT marketplace, OpenSea, charges a fee of 2.5% for every transaction.
But NFT holders also have to pay transaction fees to miners for completing NFT transactions with Ethereum. 
According to a Statista survey, NFT marketplaces grossed around $16 mln in 2020. In just a year, this figure surged by a jaw-dropping 15,000% and hit $1.57 bln in 2021. And although growth slowed in 2022, revenues still jumped by a massive 60% YoY to $2.52bln.
The following years are also set to witness double-digit growth. Statista expects the revenues of NFT marketplaces to jump by another 46% to $3.6 bln in 2023. By 2025, this figure is set to reach over $6.2 bln.
Statistics show the average revenue per user has grown 136% in the last two years, rising from around $24 to $56.80. In the next three years, ARPU is expected to double to $104.60.
Number of users jumped by 22%
Although investors’ confidence in NFTs has been fading since the crypto market crash, with the lack of clarity, theft, and scams as additional drawbacks, the Statista survey showed the number of people trading on NFT marketplaces continues to rise.
Back in 2020, NFT marketplaces had around 670,000 users. Since then, their number has increased 65 times, reaching over 44.2 mln in 2022.
In the last year only, the number of users went up by 22%. Statista expects users to rise to 50.3 mln in 2023 and continue growing to almost 60 mln by 2025.
Another Statista survey showed Thailand took the lead as the country with the highest number of NFT users worldwide, with 5.6 mln in 2021. Brazil ranked second with nearly 5 mln users, and the United States followed with 3.81 mln.
When considering the countries’ population sizes, Thailand was still ahead of other countries, with 8% of its people owning digital property. In comparison, only 3.6% of Canadians were NFT collectors, and Brazil had only a 2.3% share of NFT users.
