NFT: It ‘burns’ $129,000 due to mishandling

• On Twitter, Collector Brandon Riley Recounts How He Accidentally Burned an NFT Worth $129,000
• While he wanted to wrap his CryptoPunk, he goes to the wrong address
• This one is unsalvageable, but Riley still found an alternative

129,000 dollars gone up in smoke, or almost. Due to an error handling a CryptoPunk NFT, Brandon Riley, a collector, made it unrecoverable. In a thread on Twitter, he recounts this misadventure which burned a third of his fortune.

As Decrypt media reports, Riley wanted to post CryptoPunk #685, worth an estimated $129,000, on the NFTfi.com platform. This platform makes it possible to obtain loans in cryptocurrencies, using NFTs as collateral.

Today I accidentally burned a @cryptopunksnfts trying to wrap punk 685.

I was so focused on following the instructions exactly, that I slipped up, destroying a third of my net worth in a single transaction. @yugalabs please sell me the @v1punks 685 aces a consolation. 🙏🏼 pic.twitter.com/jHoTGvlc7j

—Brandon Riley (@vitalitygrowth) March 25, 2023

Since the CryptoPunk was not natively compatible with NFTfi, it had to “wrap” it. And it was during this process that the error occurred. In short, the collector used a wrong address, which permanently burned his NFT.

“I was so focused on following instructions exactly that I slipped, destroying a third of my net worth in a single trade”, he says. In fact, he had sent the NFT to an address intended to destroy it.

Generally, this action is voluntary, either as a symbol or to make an asset rarer (by burning some of them). But in Riley’s case, it was an accident. And unfortunately, he only realized this once the transaction was validated and irreversible. His error also reminds us that to manipulate digital assets, especially when large sums are at stake, one must be sufficiently familiar with the technology.

Saved by Bitcoin?

“Remember, I’m not a developer, I don’t know about these contracts at all, and I don’t really understand how shrouded punks work. The reality is, because I’m so unfamiliar, I should have had a different set of eyes. Looking back, it’s very easy to see all the mistakes I made”, writes the collector. He admits it was a mistake on his part.

But apparently, according to a Twitter user, the guide he used has since been changed. As for the lost or burnt NFT, this one is unrecoverable. However, thanks to the help of another Twitter user, the losses are not total.

When @olliesblog read Brandon Riley’s post, he immediately created a new NFT based on the exact same digital artwork, but on “Bitcoin ordinals”, while the CryptoPunk was on the Ethereum blockchain. Then, he offered this new NFT to Riley.

Huge thanks to @olliesblog for being so kind and selfless in resurrecting Punk 685 for me. He now lives on the Bitcoin blockchain as an ordinal, inscribed on a satoshi from over a decade ago! 😎🙏🏼 https://t.co/5i1n14HIwe pic.twitter.com/4hVPxxcb4Y

—Brandon Riley (@vitalitygrowth) March 27, 2023

And if we do not know the value (in crypto or in dollars) of this new NFT, this one has a particularity. This would be the first “official” CryptoPunk that was burned and then recreated on Bitcoin ordinals. This is a new type of Bitcoin-based NFT that is buzzing in the community. And some of the works inscribed on it, called Bitcoin Punks, are inspired by Crypto Punks.