Coinbase NFT Pauses New Collection Drops, Denies Shuttering Marketplace

In the wake of a rumored shutdown, Coinbase NFT, the non-fungible token (NFT) platform of crypto exchange Coinbase, said Wednesday that it is pausing “creator Drops” to focus its efforts on other facets of its marketplace.

“We recently shared that we are pausing creator Drops on the NFT marketplace to focus on other features and tools that creators have asked for,” Coinbase NFT confirmed in a tweet. “To be clear: We are not shutting down the Coinbase NFT marketplace.”

On Wednesday afternoon, Coinbase NFT partner Jessica Yatrofsky said her upcoming NFT collection would no longer drop on Coinbase NFT, saying she had been “privately informed that [the] marketplace was shutting down.”

Coinbase NFT quickly responded to the rumors, stating that it is indeed pausing drops to focus on improvements, but it is not shuttering the NFT marketplace.

Coinbase’s NFT drops feature allowed creators to release collections directly on the marketplace, rather than serving as a secondary marketplace such as leading NFT platform OpenSea. According to data from Dune Analytics, Coinbase NFT’s all-time trading volume is 4,454 ether (ETH), or nearly $7 million. In the month of January alone, OpenSea raked in 306,645 ETH in trading volume, about $483 million.