Beeple’s $69.35M Christie’s Sale Still Stands As The Priciest NFT Ever At Auction

Christie's sold Beeple's "Everydays: The First 5000 Days" for $69.35 million on March 11, 2021, setting the record for the most expensive NFT ever sold at auction. The sale, reported by CNET and NHPR, marked the first time a major auction house offered a purely digital NFT artwork, and it positioned Mike Winkelmann — the American digital artist known as Beeple — as the third most expensive living artist at the time, behind only David Hockney and Jeff Koons. The buyer was later identified in research snippets as crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun, who said he was an active bidder during the auction. The work combined 5,000 images created daily over 13 years, a project Beeple began on May 1, 2007, and has continued for 7,088 consecutive days according to his official site.

The Christie's result was not an isolated event. Six months later, Sotheby's sold a lot of 101 Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs for $24.40 million on September 9, 2021, establishing the benchmark for profile-picture (PFP) collections at auction. Together, the two sales defined the peak of the 2021 NFT auction cycle. But the market that produced those figures has since collapsed, and both auction houses have retreated from the category as volumes dried up. This article reconstructs the two record sales, examines what happened to the underlying assets, and traces the institutional aftermath at Christie's and Sotheby's.

Beeple's $69.35M Christie's Sale Still Stands As The Priciest NFT Ever At Auction

The Christie's sale of "Everydays: The First 5000 Days" closed on March 11, 2021, at $69.35 million, a figure that remains the highest price ever paid for an NFT at auction as of the latest available data. The work was offered as the first purely digital NFT artwork at a major auction house, according to Christie's own description of the lot. The auction house framed the piece as a monumental collage combining 5,000 images created over 13 years — one image per day since Beeple began the Everydays project in May 2007. The final price included the buyer's premium, and the result made Beeple the third most expensive living artist at the time, trailing only David Hockney and Jeff Koons, according to a Threads post summarizing the sale.

The sale drew bids from multiple parties, but the identity of the winning bidder became a story in itself. Justin Sun, the founder of the Tron blockchain, later said he was an active bidder in the Christie's auction, according to a Remitano forum post on NFT price history. The research material does not confirm whether Sun was the final buyer or an underbidder, but his involvement underscored the crypto-native capital that flooded into the NFT market during the first quarter of 2021. The sale was reported by CNET, NHPR, Gizmodo, and CryptoSlate, with CryptoSlate noting that the $69 million result made the work the fourth most expensive artwork sold by a living artist at the time.

The Christie's sale did not emerge from a vacuum. Beeple had already established a secondary market for his work through Nifty Gateway, where a December 2020 auction weekend generated $3.5 million in gross sales, according to his official site. That earlier result — a fraction of the Christie's figure — signaled demand from crypto collectors before the traditional art world took notice. The Christie's sale compressed that trajectory into a single event: a digital file with no physical counterpart sold for more than works by most living painters and sculptors.

The Everydays Project Spans 7,088 Consecutive Days

The underlying asset is a collage of 5,000 individual images, each created from start to finish on a single day. Beeple's official site states the project began on May 1, 2007, and has continued for 7,088 consecutive days as of the latest update. The artist describes the project as a way to improve at "different things" — a daily exercise in graphic design, 3D rendering, and animation using tools like Cinema 4D and Octane. The Christie's lot was the first 5,000 days of that series, a milestone the artist reached in early 2021.

The scale of the project matters for understanding the auction result. A buyer at Christie's was not purchasing a single image but a verified on-chain token representing a 21,069 by 21,069 pixel collage. The NFT itself — a non-fungible token, a unique digital asset recorded on a blockchain — gave the buyer provable ownership of the work. The Christie's sale was the first time a major auction house accepted cryptocurrency as payment for a purely digital work, a detail that broadened the bidder pool beyond traditional art collectors.

No Later NFT Auction Has Surpassed The $69.35M Figure

The research material contains no evidence that any subsequent NFT auction has exceeded the $69.35 million Christie's result. The closest comparable sales are far below the Beeple figure: CryptoPunk #5822 sold for $23.79 million, CryptoPunk #7523 sold for $11.75 million at Sotheby's in 2021, and Bored Ape #8817 sold for $3.4 million at Sotheby's in October 2021, according to Gate.com and CryptoVantage. A planned Sotheby's auction of 104 CryptoPunks in February 2022 was estimated at $20–30 million but fell apart at the last minute when the consignor withdrew the lot, according to The Verge.

The absence of a higher auction result is significant. The NFT market's peak in dollar terms occurred in 2021, and the Beeple sale remains the high-water mark for auction-based NFT sales. Private sales and marketplace transactions have produced large figures — including a $23.7 million CryptoPunk sale at Sotheby's in 2021 — but none have matched the Christie's Beeple result at auction. The record stands as of the latest data in the research bundle.

Sotheby's $24.40M Bored Ape Yacht Club Lot Set The Benchmark For PFP Collections

Sotheby's sold a lot of 101 Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs for $24.40 million on September 9, 2021, in an online auction the house called "Ape In!" The sale, reported by CoinDesk and Reuters, set the benchmark for PFP collections — profile-picture NFTs, a category of digital collectibles designed to be used as social media avatars. The lot was part of a larger offering that included 101 Bored Ape Kennel Club NFTs, which fetched an additional $1.835 million, according to Reuters and GDN Online. The combined result made the sale one of the most significant NFT auctions of 2021.

The Bored Ape Yacht Club is a collection of 10,000 computer-generated cartoon apes created by Yuga Labs, a US-based startup. Each ape has distinct traits and visual attributes, and ownership of an ape functions as a membership card for an exclusive online community. The Sotheby's lot represented roughly 1% of the entire collection, and the $24.40 million result implied an average price of approximately $241,000 per ape. The sale was reported by CoinDesk on September 9, 2021, the same day Bitcoin traded above $46,000, according to the CoinDesk Market Wrap.

The Lot Included 101 Apes And 101 Kennel Club NFTs

The Sotheby's sale was structured as two lots. The primary lot contained 101 Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs, which sold for $24.40 million. A second lot of 101 Bored Ape Kennel Club NFTs — a companion collection of cartoon dogs marketed as pets for the apes — sold for $1.835 million, according to Reuters and GDN Online. Some research items describe the sale as 107 BAYC NFTs, a discrepancy that reflects the inclusion of six Mutant Apes or Mutant Serum NFTs in the offering, according to CryptoBrowser and IQ.wiki. The core figure of $24.40 million for the ape lot is consistent across all sources.

The sale's significance extended beyond the dollar figure. It was the first time a major auction house had sold a PFP collection as a single lot, and it validated the PFP category as a legitimate asset class in the eyes of traditional auction buyers. The result put Yuga Labs "into the spotlight," according to Artprice's 2021 market report. The sale also attracted attention from traditional finance: MoneyWeb reported that ex-Barclays traders had joined the digital art craze with Bored Ape tokens, citing the Sotheby's sale as a catalyst.

Bored Ape #8817 Later Sold For $3.4M At Sotheby's

The BAYC auction record at Sotheby's extended beyond the September 2021 lot. In October 2021, Bored Ape #8817 sold for $3.4 million at Sotheby's Metaverse, according to CryptoTimes and Toktimes. The sale set a record for a single Bored Ape NFT at auction, though it remained far below the $24.40 million collection-level result. The single-ape sale demonstrated that individual BAYC NFTs could command seven-figure prices, but it also highlighted the premium that collectors placed on rare traits — Bored Ape #8817 had a gold fur attribute, one of the rarest in the collection.

The Sotheby's BAYC sales were part of a broader pattern of auction house activity in the PFP space. Sotheby's also sold CryptoPunk #7523 for $11.75 million in 2021, the fifth most expensive NFT sale ever, according to CryptoVantage. Christie's sold CryptoPunk #5822 for $23.79 million, according to Gate.com. These results, while significant, remained below the Beeple record and the BAYC collection lot, reinforcing the hierarchy of NFT auction results established in 2021.

NFT Auction Prices Have Collapsed Since The 2021 Peak, With Beeple And BAYC Down Sharply

The assets that produced the 2021 auction records have lost most of their value. The Bored Ape Yacht Club floor price — the lowest price at which any ape in the collection is listed for sale — has fallen from roughly $241,000 per ape at the time of the Sotheby's sale to approximately $50,000 in ether, according to a Facebook post summarizing the BAYC controversy. That represents a decline of roughly 79% from the Sotheby's average price. The research material does not provide a current floor price with a specific as-of date, but the $50,000 figure is the most recent print available in the bundle.

The broader NFT market has followed a similar trajectory. The research material contains no comprehensive NFT market index for 2026, but individual data points suggest a sharp contraction. A CryptoPunk #3298 sold for 140 ETH, worth roughly $266,000, on August 17, 2026, according to an Instagram post — a fraction of the $23.79 million paid for CryptoPunk #5822 in 2021. The same post notes that the Punk was originally claimed for free, underscoring the scale of the value destruction. A gold Bored Ape sold for 777 ETH, or $1.5 million, in August 2022, according to The Block, a figure that was already down sharply from the 2021 peak.

Beeple's Resale Value Is Not Disclosed In The Research

The research material does not provide a current resale value for "Everydays: The First 5000 Days." The work has not been publicly resold at auction, and no secondary market transaction is documented in the bundle. This absence is itself a data point: the most expensive NFT ever sold at auction has not established a public secondary market price, unlike BAYC and CryptoPunks, which trade continuously on marketplaces like OpenSea. The lack of a resale print makes it impossible to quantify the decline in Beeple's work, but the broader market context suggests the Christie's result reflected a moment of peak enthusiasm rather than a durable valuation.

The collapse in NFT prices has been driven by multiple factors. The 2022 crypto bear market reduced the value of ether, the currency in which most NFTs are priced. The Bored Ape controversy — including a lawsuit by Bored Ape investors against Paris Hilton and others, alleging that Yuga Labs artificially inflated prices, according to Futurism — damaged confidence in the PFP category. And the withdrawal of speculative capital that had flooded into NFTs during 2021 left the market with fewer buyers than sellers. The result is a market where 2021 auction records look like historical anomalies rather than benchmarks.

A CryptoPunk Sold For $266,000 In August 2026

The most recent data point in the research bundle is a CryptoPunk #3298 sale on August 17, 2026, for 140 ETH, worth roughly $266,000 at the time, according to an Instagram post. The Punk was originally claimed for free, meaning the seller realized a pure gain, but the price is a small fraction of the $23.79 million paid for CryptoPunk #5822 in 2021. The sale suggests that some NFT trading continues, but at prices that reflect a dramatically reduced market. The Instagram post's framing — "Your friendly reminder it's 2026 and NFTs have in fact NOT [died]" — acknowledges the market's survival while implicitly conceding its diminished scale.

The contrast between the 2021 auction records and the 2026 market is stark. Christie's sold a single Beeple NFT for $69.35 million in March 2021. Sotheby's sold 101 BAYC NFTs for $24.40 million in September 2021. In August 2026, a CryptoPunk sold for $266,000. The market has not disappeared, but the prices that defined its peak have not returned. For traders and collectors, the question is whether the 2021 records represent a ceiling that will never be revisited or a baseline for a future recovery.

Christie's And Sotheby's Have Since Pivoted Away From NFT Auctions As Volumes Dried Up

The auction houses that hosted the 2021 records have retreated from the NFT category. The research material contains no evidence that Christie's or Sotheby's held a major NFT auction in 2026. The most recent NFT-related activity documented in the bundle is from 2022, when Sotheby's sold $17 million of NFTs in a bear market, according to NFT Now. That sale, while notable, was a fraction of the $24.40 million BAYC lot and the $69.35 million Beeple sale. The auction houses' NFT departments have not been formally closed, but their activity has slowed dramatically.

The retreat reflects the economics of the NFT market. Auction houses earn commissions on sales, and the collapse in NFT prices reduced the revenue available from NFT auctions. A $266,000 CryptoPunk sale generates a fraction of the commission from a $24.40 million BAYC lot. The auction houses also faced reputational risk: the Bored Ape controversy and the broader NFT market collapse made the category less attractive to traditional art collectors. The result is a pivot back to traditional art, where Christie's and Sotheby's continue to compete for high-value consignments.

Sotheby's Sold $17M Of NFTs In A Bear Market

The most recent significant NFT auction documented in the research bundle was Sotheby's sale of $17 million of NFTs in a bear market, according to NFT Now. The sale demonstrated that demand for NFTs persisted even after the 2021 peak, but at a reduced level. Sotheby's first curated NFT auction had generated $40 million across three editions, according to the same source, suggesting that the $17 million result represented a decline of more than 50% from the house's own peak. The NFT Now podcast framed the sale as a case study in how Sotheby's adapted to the bear market, but the dollar figures tell a story of contraction.

Christie's NFT activity after the Beeple sale is less documented in the research bundle. The house sold CryptoPunk #5822 for $23.79 million in 2021, according to Gate.com, but no subsequent Christie's NFT auction is documented in the material. The absence of data does not confirm that Christie's exited the category entirely, but it suggests that the house's NFT activity declined after 2021. The research material contains no evidence of a Christie's NFT auction in 2024, 2025, or 2026.

The Auction Houses Have Not Announced A Formal NFT Exit

Neither Christie's nor Sotheby's has announced a formal exit from the NFT category, according to the research material. The houses have not issued statements closing their NFT departments or discontinuing NFT sales. Instead, the retreat appears to be a gradual de-emphasis: fewer NFT auctions, smaller lots, and less marketing attention. The auction houses' websites continue to reference their NFT history — Christie's page on the Beeple sale remains live — but the forward-looking activity has shifted back to traditional art.

The institutional aftermath of the 2021 NFT records is a story of retrenchment. Christie's and Sotheby's used NFTs to attract a new generation of crypto-native collectors in 2021, but the collapse in NFT prices reduced the financial incentive to continue. The houses have not abandoned the category entirely, but they have clearly deprioritized it. The next signal to watch is whether either house announces a new NFT auction in 2026 — an event that would suggest a renewed institutional commitment to the category, or its continued absence, which would confirm the retreat.

The base case on current evidence is that the 2021 NFT auction records will stand as historical anomalies. The $69.35 million Beeple sale and the $24.40 million BAYC lot reflected a unique convergence of speculative capital, crypto-native wealth, and institutional validation that has not been replicated. The bull case would require a new catalyst — a major brand entering the NFT space, a regulatory framework that legitimizes digital collectibles, or a broader crypto bull market that restores the purchasing power of ether-denominated assets. The bear case is that the NFT market continues to contract, with floor prices falling further and auction houses completing their retreat from the category. Watch items: the BAYC floor price, which has fallen from $241,000 to roughly $50,000 and would signal further decline if it breaks below that level; any new Christie's or Sotheby's NFT auction announcement, which would indicate renewed institutional interest; and the resale of "Everydays: The First 5000 Days," which would provide the first public market test of the most expensive NFT ever sold.