''CryptoPunks'' is a

non-fungible token A non-fungible token (NFT) is a unique digital identifier that is recorded on a blockchain and is used to certify ownership and authenticity. It cannot be copied, substituted, or subdivided. The ownership of an NFT is recorded in the blockchai ...

(NFT) collection on the

Ethereum Ethereum is a decentralized blockchain with smart contract functionality. Ether (abbreviation: ETH) is the native cryptocurrency of the platform. Among cryptocurrencies, ether is second only to bitcoin in market capitalization. It is open-s ...

blockchain The blockchain is a distributed ledger with growing lists of Record (computer science), records (''blocks'') that are securely linked together via Cryptographic hash function, cryptographic hashes. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of th ...

. The project was launched in June 2017 by the Larva Labs studio, a two-person team consisting of Canadian software developers Matt Hall and John Watkinson. The experimental project was inspired by the London

punk Punk or punks may refer to: Genres, subculture, and related aspects * Punk rock, a music genre originating in the 1970s associated with various subgenres * Punk subculture, a subculture associated with punk rock, or aspects of the subculture s ...

scenes, the

cyberpunk Cyberpunk is a subgenre of science fiction in a dystopian futuristic setting said to focus on a combination of "low-life and high tech". It features futuristic technological and scientific achievements, such as artificial intelligence and cyberwa ...

movement, and

electronic music Electronic music broadly is a group of music genres that employ electronic musical instruments, circuitry-based music technology and software, or general-purpose electronics (such as personal computers) in its creation. It includes both music ...

artists

Daft Punk Daft Punk were a French electronic music duo formed in 1993 in Paris by Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo. They achieved popularity in the late 1990s as part of the French house movement, combining house music, funk, disco, tech ...

. The crypto art blockchain project was an inspiration for the ERC-721 standard for NFTs and the modern crypto art movement, which has since become a part of the cryptocurrency and

decentralized finance Decentralized finance (often stylized as DeFi) provides financial instruments and services through smart contracts on a programmable, permissionless blockchain. This approach reduces the need for intermediaries such as brokerages, exchanges, or ...

ecosystems on multiple blockchains. CryptoPunks are commonly credited with starting the NFT craze of 2021, along with other early projects including CryptoKitties, Bored Ape Yacht Club, and the sale of Beeple's ''Everydays: The First 5000 Days''. There are 10,000 CryptoPunk tokens total. On March 2, 2022, an anonymous user donated CryptoPunk #5364 to

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

's government Ethereum wallet public address to help fund the Ukrainian government against the

Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, , starting the largest and deadliest war in Europe since World War II, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, conflict between the two countries which began in 2014. The fighting has caused hundreds of thou ...

. On March 11, 2022 it was announced that all of the CryptoPunks IP was acquired by Yuga Labs (parent company and creators of the Bored Ape Yacht Club project) for an undisclosed sum. Immediately, Yuga Labs announced they were giving full commercial rights to CryptoPunks owners. On 7th May 2022 the transfer was completed, and the whole CryptoPunks marketplace was moved to the new Yuga Labs owned website. In May 2025, Yuga Labs sold the intellectual property of CryptoPunks to the nonprofit NODE Foundation, an organization focused on the preservation of digital art. The financial details of the transaction were not disclosed, and representatives declined to comment. NODE had previously received a $25 million grant in April 2025 from investor Micky Malka and Becky Kleiner to support its mission of "building the future of digital art." Malka, who serves as the foundation’s chair, stated that CryptoPunks "sparked a cultural movement" and emphasized the foundation’s intention to "future-proof this landmark work" and make it more accessible.

Concept

There are 10,000 unique CryptoPunks (6,039 male and 3,840 female). Each one was algorithmically generated through computer code and thus no two characters are exactly alike, with some traits being rarer than others. They were originally released for free and could be claimed by anyone with an Ethereum wallet by paying only " gas fees", which were low at the time. Most of the 10,000 CryptoPunks represent humans, but there are also three special types: Zombie (88), Ape (24), and Alien (9).

Controversies

Flash loan

In October 2021, a single NFT transaction was made for 124,457 Ether (US$532 million at the time of the sale) regarding CryptoPunk #9998, much higher than all previous NFT sales, leading to speculation on social media that this could have been some kind of scam, a security exploit or

money laundering Money laundering is the process of illegally concealing the origin of money obtained from illicit activities (often known as dirty money) such as drug trafficking, sex work, terrorism, corruption, and embezzlement, and converting the funds i ...

. Larva Labs said that the purchase was made with a flash loan where the NFT's owner bought the item from themselves with borrowed money, taking out and repaying the loan within a single blockchain transaction, subsequently invalidating the sale from the asset's historic and from all the related statistics.

Sotheby's 104 CryptoPunks auction

In early 2022, a Sotheby's auction for a single lot of 104 CryptoPunks was announced. The auction took place on 23 February 2022, but its seller (''0x650d'') changed their mind 23 minutes after the auction began and decided to withdraw the auction to keep the whole lot.

References

External links