More companies and artists in the Houston region are jumping into the world of NFTs.
An NFT, or non-fungible token, is a digital asset — like an image, video, music or other piece of audio — that can be traded much like any other speculative asset. Jack Dorsey's first tweet from 2006 sold as an NFT for nearly $3 million earlier this year. NFTs are stored and traded on public digital ledgers, such as the Ethereum blockchain.
Houston-based Entoro Capital LLC provides a range of investment banking and advisory services for clients, including capital formation, mergers and acquisitions, and recapitalization, but the company is interested in NFTs as a large new asset class, said James C. Row, founder and managing partner of Entoro. Entoro is working with underwriter Valhil Capital, which is creating 10 non-fungible digital securities with the artwork of Cuban-born artist Ronaldo "Ro" Diaz. Nine of 10 of the limited edition NFTs will be sold online through Entoro's securities offering platform, OfferBoard.
The offering began Oct. 5 with minimum bids of $50,000 and will conclude Oct. 8, during the Texas Blockchain Summit taking place in Austin. Diaz's original canvas painting will be created live at the Summit on Oct. 8. Investors will receive a high-resolution NFT photograph of the original artwork and an animated video depicting the inspiration of the artwork, according to the offering memorandum. Entoro's goal is to convert the NFTs into compliant securities within two to three days after purchasing the assets.
"Given the trend toward regulation for numerous digital instruments, assets and potentially NFTs, we felt as a regulated organization it was an opportunity to get ahead of the competition and be a leader in NFT securities offerings," said Row. "With the leadership from the Valhil Capital team, it was a perfect time, event and artist to create the first NFT issued as a compliant security."
Texas Senators Ted Cruz and John Cornyn are scheduled to speak Oct. 8 at the Texas Blockchain Summit.
Meanwhile, notable Houston artist Donkeeboy is also releasing an NFT via an Oct. 12 auction. Donkeeboy, whose real name is Alex Roman Jr., is working with Houston-based NFT studio DeFi Society Studio and NFT auction platform Nifty Gateway for the offering. The NFT is part of DeFi Society’s Mad Rabbits Riot Club collection.
On Oct. 12, the Mad Rabbits collection, a series of 7,500 NFTs featuring a recurring Mad Rabbit character, will be released. Ownership of each Mad Rabbit NFT will be stored in the Ethereum blockchain.
In addition, 40% of the proceeds from the auction of the unique Mad Rabbits NFT made by Donkeeboy will be donated to a charity of his choice.
"This is an amazing opportunity to enter the NFT space with an experienced team of creators and through one of the industry’s most trusted platforms," said Donkeeboy. "I’m super excited to be contributing my own design to this collection and for the opportunity to support a good cause along the way."
This summer, Houston-based Method Architecture partnered with client Buffalo Bayou Brewing Co. to create a digital NFT rendering of the completed Buffalo Bayou Brewery at 2101 Summer St. The architecture firm minted a digital video of a flyover of the brewery location and listed the asset on the website OpenSea. The architecture firm planned to use a portion of the proceeds from the sale of the digital asset to fund support for the Texas Craft Brewers Guild.
