PR92935

PARIS, Nov. 9, 2021 /PRNewswire=KYODO JBN/ --

According to thierry Ehrmann, Artmarket.com's CEO and founder of Artprice and

Server group, "Since 1987 our group has developed an unparalleled legitimacy in

knowledge of the art market but also in knowledge of its cyber dimensions.

Indeed, faithful to our primary raison d'être, we have made a major

contribution to the development of the art market's digital sphere, notably by

dematerializing and elucidating this historically opaque market."

Artprice by Artmarket's Metaverse will be an immersive destination for

collectors and digital art enthusiasts based on a rigorous selection of NFTs

and offering the necessary experience and guarantees for this type of

ecosystem, where Artprice and its reference shareholder, Groupe Serveur, have

been clairvoyant pioneers of the internet since 1987. Few groups have been

cited in Time Magazine as such.

For almost a year now Artprice by Artmarket has been the subject of numerous

spontaneous offers for partnerships, mergers, acquisitions (partial or

complete) in the light of the emerging and considerable market for Non-Fungible

Tokens. NFTs (as they are known) are collectible digital products stored on a

blockchain.

Naturally, the NFT merchants are seeking additional credibility and a

value-creation logic specific to the online art market. And, of course, they

want to find artists already identified by their market performance as well as

credible and financially solid buyers and sellers.

In short, these players would benefit enormously from the backing and support

of Artprice as a World Leader in Art Market Information with its 5.4 million

members and its Marketplace created in 2005 offering more than 72,000 works

online in real time and its database covering 765,000 artists. For the fierce

competitors in the NFT market, Artprice by Artmarket represents the ideal

guarantor of global success.

In order to meet the urgent and vital needs of NFT competitors and other art

market players wishing to participate in the digital art market, Artprice by

Artmarket is preparing – as announced in its latest financial press releases –

its own NFT platform integrating all of the processes and industrial services.

Its domain names are already registered as artprice-nft.com and

artmarket-nft.com

In the future, Artprice's Standardized Marketplace could generate an income in

the tens of millions of euros justifying a capitalization in line with those of

recently listed blockchain players like Crypto Blockchain Industry (CBI). This

income is based, among other things, on the various recurring payables (in

physical currencies) that are inherent to the industrial processes underlying

the Blockchain/NFT economy.

As we have all seen, there has been a veritable flood of media attention on the

NFT phenomenon and all of the art market's major players have rushed to

incorporate NFTs, at any cost, into their economic model, including Christie's

and Sotheby's, the latter having announced the creation of its NFT platform,

Sotheby's Metaverse, on 14 October 2021.

With the support of its various specialized departments, Artprice by Artmarket

has conducted in-depth studies and analyses into the NFT phenomenon and is

consequently acutely aware that the field is substantially more complex than it

appears.

In the first place, you need Blockchain know-how, an area that Artprice has

been working on for several years and which has earned it 'Innovative Company'

label twice, awarded by France's Public Investment Bank (BPI).

In terms of infrastructure, any potential player in this field would need clean

rooms and its entire Operating System in proprietary mode. Then they would need

to have excellent knowledge of the history and management of crypto-currencies

and of the Wallet system to avoid traps. Lastly, they would need expertise in

art history specialised in the origins of the Internet and cyberculture, in

order to identify what constitutes digital fine art. These different types of

knowledge require skills that are both vertical and transversal.

In its various projections and models, Artprice by Artmarket has examined the

veritable profit centers within the entire NFT process / knowledge chain. It

has notably focused on the functional and economic reality of operating a

platform with primary NFT issuers, and the buy and sell side of NFTs on the

secondary market. Great efforts were made to identify and distinguish between

the various recurring revenue items and those which are subject to the vagaries

of the market, and it has also been revealed that from an accounting stance,

the recurring and income generating activities are primarily accessible in

dollars or euros.

What transpires very clearly indeed is that the main players in NFTs are above

all major players in the crypto-currencies field. To ignore this filiation

would be a major error in the comprehension of this ecosystem, which few people

really master.

Artmarket.com has therefore carefully examined the main sales that have

contributed to the notoriety of NFTs and it finds the same players in both

cryptocurrencies and NFTs, with the latter representing a way out of

cryptocurrency via a non-fungible asset. This analysis is essential because it

highlights the strengths and weaknesses of the early players in the crypto

universe.

The sale of the first digital work at Christie's had the effect of an

earthquake by propelling BEEPLE (alias Mike Winkelmann) – unknown to anyone

outside the digital art sphere – to third place on the auction results podium

for living artists, behind Jeff Koons and David Hockney. After the

record-breaking sale of Everydays: The first 5000 Days, a digital file in JPEG

format that fetched the staggering price of $69.3 million on 11 March 2021,

digital art must be considered a creative current of tremendous value.

The purpose of this $69.3 million purchase of Everydays: The first 5000 Days by

two Indian businessmen was therefore to claim a certain 'equivalence' between

all countries in the world and to show that buying art is not a field reserved

to Western collectors. This parity is 'enabled' by the emergence of

cryptocurrencies, a logical posture for these two men who made their fortunes

with the purchase of Ethereum, one of the hundreds of cryptocurrencies in

circulation around the world.

Another branch of Artprice's research into the NFT market has focused on the

legal dimension, and it has concluded that the field raises a large number of

legal questions which only a few rare players (like Artprice) are equipped to

answer.

One example concerns intellectual property law: everyone agrees that the

various transactions involving an NFT artwork clearly record the deeds of

ownership; but what about the copyright, patrimonial rights, moral rights,

reproduction rights, etc. relating to the primary issue of an NFT. Artprice,

through its expertise and experience in this field can respond to this void by

creating the necessary bridge between the NFT and the Physical Art Market.

At the ADAGP (French society for the collection and distribution of copyright

in the field of graphic and plastic arts), where Artprice by Artmarket is one

of the main contributors, NFTs have been the subject of substantial

level-headed scrutiny. According to its legal director Thierry Maillard, "It is

important to legally secure the link between the NFT and the artist and his/her

beneficiaries, to structure the practices and to provide for trusted third

parties". These observations all lead very clearly towards Artprice because

Artprice already has the requisite expertise, infrastructure and know-how to

handle these delicate issues.

Likewise, according to Blanche Sousi, Emeritus Professor at the University of

Lyon 3, Holder of the Jean Monnet Chair in European Banking and Monetary Law,

Honorary Director of the Institute of Law and Business Economics and member of

the Scientific Committee of the Institut Art et Droit of which Artprice is a

member, the issuance of a primary NFT must comply with the provisions of the

Monetary and Financial Code (digital assets in French law or Crypto assets in

European law) .

Lastly, concerning the birth of a new art movement, we endorse the analysis of

art historian Michael Maizels who has said: 'I am an art historian who has

carried out extensive research on the evolution of the market for 'recent art'.

And I can tell you that something generational is now happening with NFTs.'

At this stage in the game, a solid knowledge is required of cyber-culture and

its interaction with the art market for almost forty years, all this, in order

to be able to define the emergence of new Contemporary artists whose NFT works

appeal to new collectors.

Notwithstanding the media hype surrounding NFTs, it is important to identify

the different areas of knowledge (which can only be acquired over time)

necessary for an effective and profitable activity in this area. After which,

an NFT Marketplace can be founded and capture the recurring and highly

profitable revenues that this market will generate in physical currency (i.e.

Euros / Dollars) in order to hedge against a crypto-exchange risk and a tax

system that is clearly 'a work in progress'.

So, on the demand side, Artprice's global clientele will be ready to take the

plunge as soon as they feel secure about their transactions, and on the supply

side, Artprice is confident that it can attract artists for the creation of

their NFTs on the primary issue market.

On the broader art market, it is now clear that all the major operators feel an

imperative need to base their credibility on macro and microeconomic data with

a sharp analysis of the market. This type of credibility is precisely what

Artprice by Artmarket can bring to them in its role as a Global Leader in Art

Market Information for nearly 25 years - via reports, indices, graphs and data

(used by more than 7,200 print and digital media).

Confidence in NFTs can only come from a player that has been monitoring and

mastering the art market's economy with its exponential development since 2000

(turnover up 2,700% in the Contemporary art field).

Artprice by Artmarket considers that digital art undoubtedly represents a

paradigm shift. However it also considers that only a few rare players will be

able to offer an integrated and coherent industrial chain of processes and

services with the right legal environments, the right economic and financial

analysis, and, of course, the right kind of customer pedagogy which is

absolutely essential to creating confidence in this Metaverse (future version

of the Internet initiated by the vision of Neal Stephenson in 1992 in his

post-apocalyptic cyberpunk universe of 'Snow crash').

Artprice by Artmarket can elucidate the real protagonists of cyber culture who

were immersed in the digital world long before anyone else. Artprice and Groupe

Serveur, its major shareholder, envisaged the birth of this new world in 1987.

Artprice by Artmarket's head office is the world-renowned Organe Museum of

Contemporary Art that manages the Demeure du Chaos / Abode of Chaos (dixit the

NYT) which is cited in art history literature as one of the most important

references of the post-apocalyptic cyberpunk universe (subject of over 3,600

media reports in 21 years). The Museum of Contemporary Art, Demeure du Chaos /

Abode of Chaos plans to issue thousands of NFTs by its sole author, thierry

Ehrmann, an artist/sculptor and Founder of Artprice and Server group (link to

biography in Who's Who France).

Biographie_nov2020_WhosWho_thierryEhrmann.pdf [https://imgpublic.artprice.com/img/wp/sites/11/2021/06/Biographie_nov2020_WhosWho_thierryEhrmann.pdf]

The paradigm shift that the arrival of NFTs represents suggests it will take

several decades to define which bodies / authorities / institutions / experts

will emerge as being authoritative with respect to digital art creations and

the definition of the cognitive value of digital artworks. Artprice by

Artmarket is among the few rare players who stand positioned to engage in such

a commitment.

Artprice by Artmarket will select its artists and NFT works from its

Marketplace to convey its vision of digital art.

According to research conducted by Artprice by Artmarket, the most popular NFT

platforms for artists are OpenSea, SuperRare, Nifty Gateway, Rarible, Known

Origin, Hic et Nunc (the least energy-consuming).

Also read Contemporary art auctions boosted by NFTs (Artprice report) (AFP) 2021

Online sales are now an integral part of auction house strategies. Christie's,

Sotheby's and Phillips have dematerialized just over half of their operations.

But it's not just the majors ones; the online proportion for the world's

auction houses taken as a whole is currently 41% for 2021. A new step has

clearly been taken with the thunderous arrival of NFTs.

According to Artprice's Contemporary Art Market Annual Report published last

Monday, Contemporary art auctions reached a historic turnover level of $2.7

billion in the 2020-2021 period (end-June to beginning-July), boosted by NFTs

and online auctions.

For Artmarket.com, all options are on the table, including the other

hypothesis: an immediate partnership with a major NFT platform. This would

generate huge saving in time and the economies of scale would therefore produce

an immediate financial gain with a rapid boost in net income that would be

added to a distinctly profitable balance sheet, and would therefore will be a

significant growth driver.

The Artprice by Artmarket(R) NFT marketplace benefits notably from the domain

names 'Artmarket.com, Artmarket.net, Artmarket.org' which naturally capture

searches using the terms Art Market ( English being the language of the Art

Market). With a simple search 'art market', the top 12 unsponsored natural

results out of 3.33 billion results on Google.com lead to Artprice by

Artmarket's databases.

Finally, it is essential to remember that with Artprice and Cision (PR

Newswire), Artprice by Artmarket's Marketplace will benefit from the first

press agency dedicated to Art Market information: Artpress agency(R) is a press

agency created in 1999 and 100% owned by Artprice, the World Leader in Art

Market Information.

For 120 years Cision has gradually built a global network for the dissemination

of information / news recognized by more than 100,000 well-known clients on

financial markets.

Cision is the world leader in PR & Influence software and media research.

With its database of 1.6 million journalists and media organisations, Cision

delivers qualitative information concerning the daily information generated by

Artprice by Artmarket to a target population 450 million through its press

agency Artpress Agency in the native language of each country on all five

continents.

The agreement is the direct result of a long relationship spanning two decades

between Artprice and Cision, two powerful leaders in their respective markets.

Copyright 1987-2021 thierry Ehrmann www.artprice.com - www.artmarket.com

- Don't hesitate to contact our Econometrics Department for your requirements

regarding statistics and personalized studies: econometrics@artprice.com

- Try our services (free demo): https://www.artprice.com/demo

- Subscribe to our services: https://www.artprice.com/subscription

About Artmarket:

Artmarket.com is listed on Eurolist by Euronext Paris, SRD long only and

Euroclear: 7478 - Bloomberg: PRC - Reuters: ARTF.

Discover Artmarket and its Artprice department on video: www.artprice.com/video

Artmarket and its Artprice department was founded in 1997 by its CEO, thierry

Ehrmann. Artmarket and its Artprice department is controlled by Groupe Serveur,

created in 1987.

See certified biography in Who's who (C):

https://imgpublic.artprice.com/img/wp/sites/11/2021/06/Biographie_nov2020_WhosWho_thierryEhrmann.pdf

Artmarket is a global player in the Art Market with, among other structures,

its Artprice department, world leader in the accumulation, management and

exploitation of historical and current art market information in databanks

containing over 30 million indices and auction results, covering more than

770,000 artists.

Artprice Images(R) allows unlimited access to the largest Art Market image bank

in the world: no less than 180 million digital images of photographs or

engraved reproductions of artworks from 1700 to the present day, commented by

our art historians.

Artmarket with its Artprice department accumulates data on a permanent basis

from 6300 Auction Houses and produces key Art Market information for the main

press and media agencies (7,200 publications). Its 5.4 million ('members log

in'+social media) users have access to ads posted by other members, a network

that today represents the leading Global Standardized Marketplace(R) to buy and

sell artworks at a fixed or bid price (auctions regulated by paragraphs 2 and 3

of Article L 321.3 of France's Commercial Code).

Artmarket with its Artprice department, has been awarded the State label

"Innovative Company" by the Public Investment Bank (BPI) (for the second time

in November 2018 for a new period of 3 years) which is supporting the company

in its project to consolidate its position as a global player in the market art.

Artprice's 2020/21 Contemporary Art Market Report by Artmarket.com:

https://www.artprice.com/artprice-reports/the-contemporary-art-market-report-2021

Artprice by Artmarket's 2020 Global Art Market Report published in March 2021:

https://www.artprice.com/artprice-reports/the-art-market-in-2020

Index of press releases posted by Artmarket with its Artprice department:

serveur.serveur.com/press_release/pressreleaseen.htm

Follow all the Art Market news in real time with Artmarket and its Artprice

department on Facebook and Twitter:

www.facebook.com/artpricedotcom/ (over 5,4 million followers)

twitter.com/artmarketdotcom

twitter.com/artpricedotcom

Discover the alchemy and universe of Artmarket and its artprice department

https://www.artprice.com/video headquartered at the famous Organe Contemporary

Art Museum "The Abode of Chaos" (dixit The New York Times):

https://issuu.com/demeureduchaos/docs/demeureduchaos-abodeofchaos-opus-ix-1999-2013

L'Obs - The Museum of the Future: https://youtu.be/29LXBPJrs-o

www.facebook.com/la.demeure.du.chaos.theabodeofchaos999

(4.4 million followers)

https://vimeo.com/124643720

Contact Artmarket.com and its Artprice department - Contact: Thierry Ehrmann,

ir@artmarket.com

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Logo - https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1009603/Art_Market_logo.jpg

Source: Artmarket.com