The rise of the coin of the apes

The team behind Bored Ape Yacht Club is bringing forward plans for an official ‘ApeCoin’ token.

Chimp my ride

We’ll be the first to admit, ApeCoins, Bored Apes and NFTs might not be what we imagined when we pictured 2022. But unless you’ve let NFTs pass you by completely, it’s something we’ve all come to accept.

Yuga Labs, the team behind the booming Bored Ape Yacht Club, has been luring investors into buying its lucrative and exclusive digital artworks – NFTs – for months. Now, it’s moving into crypto with its very own token.

Monkey business

The ApeCoin helps Yuga Labs continue to grow its crypto offerings and is slated to keep the crypto ecosystem growing. Raking in as much as $240,000 in Ethereum per Bored Ape NFT, there’s no exact word on how much of a dent ApeCoin will leave in your wallet. But with an initial offering of one billion coins to be minted and used as in-game currency, there’s going to be a whole lot of demand for them – so don’t expect them to come cheap.

But is it all plain sailing? The legal framework around crypto and NFTs is, shall we say, loosely defined. Regulators aren’t going near this digital industry yet, but with NFTs often coming packaged as unregistered securities, there’s some careful maneuvering to be done.

That’s why a separate entity, ApeCoin DAO rather than Yuga, will be launching the token. It’s headed up by many of the same names associated with the labs, but is officially something different.

If you’re a big fan of crypto though, this is one offering to keep a close eye on.