Pudgy Penguin's 'Snowed In' collection sells out at Sotheby's

A colony of rare Pudgy Penguins have sold out in an auction held by Sotheby's.

The "Snowed In: A Rare Pudgy Penguins Sale" collection of ten NFTs brought in almost $129,000, with the pieces on offer including several rare Pudgy Penguins featuring traits such as gold skin and an egg accessory.

The average sale price of $12,900 for each NFT was well above the collection's current floor price of $1,300. The sale total was firmly within the pre-sale estimate, Sotheby's said. Winning bids will receive soulbound tokens as proof of participation in the sale.

Despite the bear market, Davis Brown, Sotheby’s head of sale for this auction, said it had "consistently seen strong participation across our NFT sales in recent months, irrespective of market conditions."

"An auction setting is truly the best test of the market since it is an open and fair assessment of collector interest and sets new benchmarks in terms of value," said Brown.

Only 24H remain on our historic Sotheby’s Auction! ⏰

In case you missed it, here are some key elements of the sale! 🧵 https://t.co/PcZ4QHooYJ pic.twitter.com/QStJBMdRPl

— Pudgy Penguins (@pudgypenguins) November 29, 2022

Since May, the drop in the price of ether relative to the dollar has been a major factor in the slump in NFT marketplace volumes. Volumes have declined each month since May this year, according to The Block's data dashboard. 

The decline in individual transactions has not been as steep but has nevertheless dropped every month since July.

Sotheby's started offering NFTs through auction, buy-now and generative drops in 2021, starting with its first sale in April of NFTs by digital artist Pak. That collection alone raked in $16.8 million from 3,000 buyers.

Sotheby's reported that in the course of last year, it earned over $100 million in NFT sales. Its NFT adventure has paid off in other ways, too — around 78% of the buyers were also new to Sotheby's.