10 Best NFT Stocks to Buy Now

In this article, we discuss 10 best NFT stocks to buy now.

NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, are digital assets that represent ownership of a unique item or a piece of content. NFTs utilize blockchain technology, which ensures their authenticity and traceability. While this concept had been around for a few years prior, it was in 2017 that NFTs captured mainstream attention and generated widespread interest through the launch of Cryptokitties, a blockchain-based game. It allowed users to collect, breed, and trade virtual cats represented as NFTs.

NFTs are primarily bought and sold through NFT marketplaces, which serve as platforms where creators can list their NFTs for sale, and buyers can browse and purchase those NFTs. Some well-known marketplaces include OpenSea, Rarible, Foundation, and Mintable. Investing in NFTs can be challenging for amateurs as it requires a combination of research, knowledge, and personal preferences. The best NFTs for beginners would be those that are unique, well-executed, and have the potential to grow because the market is highly volatile and subject to rapid changes.

In 2021, a significant surge in interest, adoption, and activity surrounding NFTs was observed. Numerous high-profile NFT sales and collaborations with mainstream artists, musicians, athletes, and brands captured broad interest and media coverage. One notable example was the sale of Beeple’s artwork, “Everydays— The First 5000 Days,” which fetched $69 million at auction in March 2021. This sale made headlines and solidified NFTs as a viable platform for digital art. However, high-interest rates and inflation last year brought the sustainability and long-term value of the NFT market into question. In December 2022, NFT sales dropped to their lowest level since July 2021, as reported by Bloomberg. Reuters also mentioned DappRadar data in its report, highlighting that NFT sales fell to $3.4 billion in the third quarter of 2022, from $8.4 billion in the prior-year quarter.

Despite such performance last year, the overall NFT market showed signs of recovery in 2023. According to DappRadar, a total of 19.4 million NFTs were sold during the first quarter of 2023, up 8.5% from the previous quarter. The report also mentioned that the trading volumes climbed $4.7 billion during the quarter, showing a 137% growth from the preceding quarter. In addition to this, the development of user-friendly marketplaces and improved infrastructure contributed to growing sales. For example, Blend, a new peer-to-peer perpetual lending platform, made over $442 million in sales in May. Launched on May 1, Blur now represents 65% of the overall NFT market share, as reported by Fortune.

The gradual rise of digital art and collectibles has fueled the growth of the NFT market. According to Market Research’s report, the NFT market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 27.6% from 2022 to 2032, gaining a value of $342.5 billion. The report also highlighted that the market was valued at $38.2 billion in 2022.

NFTs also grabbed the attention of some major companies and brands. The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE:KO) auctioned its NFTs for over $575,000 in 2021. Similarly, McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE:MCD) launched a limited edition of McRib NFTs in 2021 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of its pork sandwich. NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE)’s Cryptokicks is the company’s first virtual sneaker collection, featuring over 20,000 unique NFTs.

10 Best NFT Stocks to Buy Now

Photo by Sajad Nori on Unsplash

Our Methodology:

We scoured Insider Monkey’s database of 943 hedge funds as of Q1 2023 and selected companies that are directly or indirectly involved in the creation and selling of NFTs and also pursued NFT-related goals. The stocks are ranked in ascending order of the number of funds that have stakes in them as of Q1.

10. Funko, Inc. (NASDAQ:FNKO)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 11

Funko, Inc. (NASDAQ:FNKO) is a Washington-based toy company that sells unique pop culture collectibles, accessories, and toys. It officially entered the NFT market in 2021 with its Digital Pop! series, which are NFTs in the form of digital collectibles that features the company’s unique stylized figures. In 2022, the company announced its partnership with Warner Bros to create some of its most beloved iconic characters.

In the first quarter of 2023, Funko, Inc. reported a 61% year-over-year growth in its direct-to-consumer net sales, driven mainly by e-commerce capabilities. The company’s revenue for the quarter came in at roughly $252 million. Its Core Collectible segment generated over $183.4 million in revenues. FNKO is among the best NFT stocks to buy on our list.

Other companies that are involved in the NFT space include The Coca-Cola Company, McDonald’s Corporation, and NIKE, Inc..

At the end of Q1 2023, 11 hedge funds in Insider Monkey’s database reported having stakes in Funko, Inc., compared with 15 in the previous quarter. These stakes have a collective value of over $62.5 million.

9. Coinbase Global, Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 28

Coinbase Global, Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN) is an American company that operates a cryptocurrency exchange platform. The company’s marketplace for NFTs, Coinbase NFT, allows users to buy, sell, and discover NFTs from different artists and creators. Since its launch in April 2022 through February 2023, the company’s total NFT trading volume came in at $7.3 million.

In the first quarter of 2023, Coinbase Global, Inc. reported revenue of $772.5 million, which beat analysts’ estimates by $119.2 million. The company’s operating cash flow for the quarter came in at over $463 million, up from $91.3 million during the same period last year. It is one of the best NFT stocks to buy now.

In May, Atlantic Securities upgraded Coinbase Global, Inc. to Overweight from Neutral with a $70 price target, following the company’s strong quarterly earnings.

As of the close of Q1 2023, 28 hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey owned stakes in Coinbase Global, Inc., up from 27 in the previous quarter. These stakes are collectively valued at over $1.15 billion. With over 11.7 million shares, ARK Investment Management was the company’s leading stakeholder in Q1.

8. Mattel, Inc. (NASDAQ:MAT)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 31

Mattel, Inc. (NASDAQ:MAT) is an American multinational toy manufacturing company, based in California. The company’s first-quarter revenue of $814.6 million beat Street estimates by $73.86 million. It generated over $206 million in operating cash flow, showing an increase of $63 million from the prior-year quarter. MAT is among the best NFT stocks on our list.

In November 2022, Mattel, Inc. launched its own NFT marketplace on its direct-to-consumer platform, Mattel Creations. Recently, the company unveiled its second non-fungible collection, featuring cars from the blockbuster Fast & Furious movie franchise. It will be selling this limited collection for $20 per pack.

In April, DA Davidson reiterated its Buy rating on Mattel, Inc. with a $23 price target, highlighting the company’s direct-to-consumer segment. The firm also expects the company to deliver strong sales this year.

The number of hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey owning stakes in Mattel, Inc. grew to 31 in Q1 2023, from 27 in the previous quarter. These stakes have a collective value of roughly $984 million.

Ariel Investments mentioned Mattel, Inc. in its Q4 2022 investor letter. Here is what the firm has to say:

“Toy manufacturer, Mattel, Inc. (NASDAQ:MAT) also weighed on relative returns in the quarter. Although sales came in slightly lower than expectations, strong gross margins drove a solid earnings beat. MAT maintained its full-year revenue outlook but lowered its EPS guide to account for Fx headwinds and greater promotions and discounts on high price-point items. We remain encouraged by management’s execution on its strategy to grow market share, improve profitability and generate higher levels of cash flow. We continue to view MAT as an undervalued asset with attractive growth prospects, particularly with the reintroduction of the Disney Princess and Frozen toy lines, Trolls, the global launch of Monster High, and product support around the highly anticipated Barbie movie in 2023.”

7. DraftKings Inc. (NASDAQ:DKNG)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 37

A sports betting company, DraftKings Inc. (NASDAQ:DKNG) is next on our list of the best NFT stocks to buy now. The company’s NFT market allows users to access, view, or sell their NFTs bought through the company. The marketplace is particularly popular among those looking to trade sports collectibles.

In the first quarter of 2023, DraftKings Inc. generated $770 million in revenues, which showed an 84.7% growth from the same period last year. The company also reported a 39% year-over-year growth in its Monthly Unique Payers (MUP) to 2.8 million on average.

DraftKings Inc. is gaining positive ratings from Wall Street analysts following its strong quarterly earnings. In June, both BTIG Research and Jefferies Financial Group raised their price targets on the stock to $31 and $35, respectively.

As of the close of Q1 2023, 37 hedge funds in Insider Monkey’s database owned stakes in DraftKings Inc., up from 32 a quarter earlier. The total value of these stakes is over $1.1 billion.

Baron Funds made the following comment about DraftKings Inc. in its Q1 2023 investor letter:

“We re-initiated a position in former Fund holding DraftKings Inc. (NASDAQ:DKNG), a leading online sportsbook, digital casino, and daily fantasy sports operator. DraftKings’ mobile applications offer consumers the ability to wager on a wide variety of sporting events and play hundreds of real-money casino games. The company has spent the past three years building a proprietary technology stack that improves the customer experience and delivers best-in-class breadth of bet types (such as parlays, same-game parlays, and player props). State-level online sports betting (OSB) and iCasino legalization, along with a multi-year consumer adoption timeline in active states, has supported a 90% revenue growth rate for DraftKings since 2020. The opportunity for OSB legalization remains significant, with under 50% of the U.S. population currently having legal mobile sports betting. We expect 65% to 80% of the population will eventually have access to OSB. ICasino is currently legal in just seven states representing roughly 13% of the population. ICasino product adoption in legalized states has been robust, with the average user spending twice as much as a sports bettor. While the pace of legalization for iCasino has been slower, we believe additional states will pass regulation in the coming years.

As U.S. states began to legalize sports betting, the DraftKings management team moved quickly to build widespread brand awareness. DraftKings is the #2 operator in both OSB and iCasino by a wide margin, and has demonstrated improving market share trends across almost all states. When a new state legalizes sports betting, DraftKings has a first mover advantage as many of its customers are converted from the DraftKings daily fantasy sports offering. The quality of their sportsbook product along with increasingly targeted promotional spending results in strong customer retention and high lifetime values. In states where iCasino is legal, DraftKings can cross-sell OSB customers. DraftKings’ scale and product advantages are creating a flywheel that will enable the company to continue to out-invest the competition in acquisition marketing, retention, and research and development. The high barriers to entry are resulting in a consolidated industry that will eventually lead to a highly profitable business. This is evidenced by older-vintage state contribution margins that are already approaching 40%. Longer term, we believe DraftKings can generate EBITDA margins between 20% and 30% with strong free-cash-flow conversion.”

6. Cloudflare, Inc. (NYSE:NET)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 41

Cloudflare, Inc. (NYSE:NET) is a California-based IT service management company that provides a wide range of services, including cloud and cybersecurity. In the first quarter of 2023, the company reported revenue of $290.2 million, up 36.8% from the same period last year. Its operating cash flow for the quarter came in at $36.4 million, which represented 13% of its total revenue. The company also generated roughly $14 million in free cash flow.

In 2021, Cloudflare, Inc. announced that its Cloudflare Stream platform supports NFTs. The platform allows users to host and deliver video content associated with NFTs. The Coca-Cola Company, McDonald’s Corporation, and NIKE, Inc. are some other major companies expanding their NFT exposure.

At the end of March 2023, 41 hedge funds in Insider Monkey’s database reported having stakes in Cloudflare, Inc., up from 40 in the preceding quarter. These stakes are collectively worth $774.7 million.

Baron Funds mentioned Cloudflare, Inc. in its Q1 2023 investor letter. Here is what the firm has to say:

“We also added to Cloudflare, Inc. (NYSE:NET) during the quarter, the leading cloud-based networking and software infrastructure provider. Despite facing a macro-driven elongation of deal cycles, the company reported solid quarterly results with 42% year-over-year revenue growth, while also guiding to 37% growth for 2023. The company’s speed of innovation enables it to continuously grow its opportunity set as it adds more products to its platform, solving additional problems for customers from network services to zero-trust. Its scale-based competitive advantages enable it to be the low-cost provider in the industry, while also having significant volumes of data to power its AI models and improve its product over time. Once it gets customers on board, Cloudflare is then able to cross-sell them additional networking and security solutions at high marginal profitability, as they are served on the same underlying infrastructure and thus the company doesn’t need to spend once more on customer acquisition. This creates a virtuous cycle that should enable Cloudflare to become an important part of the infrastructure layer of organizations over time, in our view.”

5. eBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 44

eBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY) ranks fifth on our list of the best NFT stocks to buy now. The American e-commerce company launched its first collection of NFTs in collaboration with web3 company Oneof in May 2022. A year before this, the company also introduced the option to buy and sell NFTs. eBay Inc. owns KnownOrigin, which is one of the most innovative marketplaces for NFTs.

In the first quarter of 2023, eBay Inc. generated revenue of $2.51 billion, which saw a 1.2% growth from the same period last year. During the quarter, the company returned $134 million to shareholders in dividends. It currently pays a quarterly dividend of $0.25 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.20%, as of June 16.

At the end of Q1 2023, 44 hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey owned stakes in eBay Inc., compared with 47 in the previous quarter. Their collective stake value is over $1.11 billion. With over 5.2 million shares, Rima Senvest Management was the company’s leading stakeholder in Q1.

4. Shopify Inc. (NYSE:SHOP)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 66

Shopify Inc. (NYSE:SHOP) is a Canadian multinational e-commerce company that helps small businesses to build online stores through one streamlined dashboard. The company reported strong results in the first quarter of 2023, with revenue of $1.5 billion, up 25.8% from the same period last year. Its free cash flow of $86 million represented 6% of its revenues.

Shopify Inc. allowed selling NFTs directly through its stores in 2021. Earlier this year, the company allowed its merchants to design, mint, and sell NFTs through its Venly Shopify Merchant App. It is among the best NFT stocks on our list.

At the end of March 2023, 66 hedge funds in Insider Monkey’s database owned investments in Shopify Inc., the same as in the previous quarter. The stakes owned by these hedge funds have a collective value of over $2.4 billion.

RiverPark Advisors mentioned Shopify Inc. in its Q1 2023 investor letter.  Here is what the firm has to say:

“Shopify Inc. (NYSE:SHOP): Shopify shares were a top contributor in the quarter as the market focused on the company’s recent price increases and its ongoing market share gains in e-commerce gross merchandise volumes (GMV). Earlier in the quarter the company reported better-than-expected 4Q results, with 26% revenue growth and $248 million of FCF (at a 14% margin), significantly better than the Street consensus of -$109 million.

Last year, 10% of US retail e-commerce sales flowed through SHOP, second only to Amazon, and the company is still enjoying significant tailwinds as retail merchants of all sizes adopt SHOP’s software tools to display, manage and sell their products across a dozen different sales channels. We believe that the overall growth of e-commerce, combined with the development of new products and services, such as its digital wallet Shop Pay and its pick, pack and ship Shopify Fulfillment Network, should continue to drive revenue growth of about 20% per year over the next several years, accompanied by re-acceleration of operating margin growth and FCF generation.”

3. NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 81

NIKE, Inc. is an Oregon-based footwear manufacturing company. Though it is not the traditional NFT stock, the company acquired a digital sneakers company, RTFKT, in December 2021 to accelerate its metaverse play. According to a report by Vogue Business, this acquisition resulted in NIKE, Inc. generating over $185 million in NFT revenues. Moreover, it also launched its first NFT drop in April this year.

NIKE, Inc. was a popular stock among elite funds in Q1 2023, as 81 funds owned stakes in the company, up from 71 in the previous quarter, according to Insider Monkey’s database. These stakes are collectively worth over $2.35 billion.

2. NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 132

NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) is a California-based multinational tech company. Its Omniverse platform builds and operates a wide range of metaverse apps. In addition to this, the company also has deals with several marketplaces where creators can sell their 3D work. This makes NVDA one of the best NFT stocks on our list.

NVIDIA Corporation experienced a positive hedge fund sentiment in Q1 2023, as 132 hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey owned stakes in the company, up from 106 in the previous quarter.

Saltlight Capital mentioned NVIDIA Corporation and its AI technologies in its Q1 2023 investor letter. Here is what the firm has to say:

“In May 2021, we shared our thoughts on AI with a particular focus on NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA), expressing our belief that it was poised to become a significant enabler of AI technology. At the time, it felt like our insights were being carried away by the wind.

Our thesis hinged on the idea that NVIDIA’s GPUs would form the fundamental computing hardware for neural networks. This hardware would not only develop AI tools and infrastructure but also democratise access to AI technology.

At the end of that letter, we included a substantial excerpt from an interview with NVIDIA’s CEO, Jensen Huang. Looking back, his words now seem eerily prophetic. He suggested, albeit vaguely, a solution to the complexity problem. He said:

“But finally, we have this piece of this new technology called artificial intelligence that can write that complex software so that we can automate it. The whole goal of writing software is to automate something. We’re in this new world where, over the next 10 years, we’re going to see the automation of automation””…(Click here to read the full text)

1. Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 173

An American financial services company, Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) tops our list of the best NFT stocks to buy. In May this year, the company announced its Visa Creator Program, which would allow digital creators to enhance their small businesses through NFTs. In addition to this, the company also bought an NFT worth $150,000 in 2021.

As of the close of Q1 2023, 173 hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held stakes in Visa Inc., compared with 177 in the previous quarter. Collectively, these stakes are worth over $26 billion.

Polen Capital made the following comment about Visa Inc. in its Q1 2023 investor letter:

“We trimmed Mastercard and Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) to equal weights of the Portfolio. Mastercard and Visa operate as a duopoly in a large and growing market. Over the last 50 years, global personal consumer expenditures (PCE) has grown 7-9% annualized. We expect 4-5% long-term PCE growth going forward. Additionally, the shift from cash to credit continues unabated, with a total credit penetration of only approximately 50% globally.3 This shift provides Visa and Mastercard with another ~4-6% of growth. When combined with PCE, this gives both companies high-single-digit to low-double[1]digit revenue growth opportunities. This growth estimate is before accounting for growth amplifiers like the acceleration of e[1]commerce, the shift from offline to online, and additional services. Both companies enjoy extremely strong network effects that provide strong competitive advantages.

We have trimmed Visa and Mastercard because their combined weight grew to over 12% of the Global Growth Portfolio because of their recent performance and to fund our increase in Amazon’s position size. We added to both positions when their prices were depressed due to cross-border transactions deteriorating materially from the pandemic. Cross-border volumes came roaring back when travel corridors reopened, and although we are several quarters removed from the cross-border nadir, Visa still grew volumes >30% in 1Q23. Total cross-border volumes are now 132% of 2019 levels. At 4.5% each, both companies remain high conviction positions for Global Growth.”

You can also take a look at Insider Buying Alert: 10 Stocks Seeing Insider Activity and 14 Best Annual Dividend Stocks To Buy Now

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This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.