IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/116704.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Market Manipulation in NFT Markets

Author

Listed:
  • Oh, Sebeom

Abstract

Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) are a new form of digital asset used for fundraising purposes, similar to equity crowdfunding, but within an unregulated environment. The NFT market has been described as an unregulated and prone to misconduct, but there is a lack of detailed analysis on such behaviors. This paper examines the use of manipulative trading, specifically unrevealed insider trading and wash trading, within the NFT market using publicly available transaction data on the Ethereum blockchain. The results show that insiders buying behavior strongly predicts higher future price returns. Even if the circulated USD amount in wash trades is more than 422 million, wash trades fails to impact meaningful market outcomes. I find that some investors engage in wash trading to earn rewards from NFT marketplaces or promote emerging marketplaces in competition with the dominant platform.

Suggested Citation

  • Oh, Sebeom, 2023. "Market Manipulation in NFT Markets," MPRA Paper 116704, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:116704
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/116704/1/MPRA_paper_116704.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/117531/1/Draft_NFT_Market_Manipulation.pdf
    File Function: revised version
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/117629/1/Draft_NFT_Market_Manipulation.pdf
    File Function: revised version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Aitken, Michael & Cumming, Douglas & Zhan, Feng, 2015. "High frequency trading and end-of-day price dislocation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 330-349.
    2. Thomas J. Chemmanur & Paolo Fulghieri, 2014. "Entrepreneurial Finance and Innovation: An Introduction and Agenda for Future Research," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(1), pages 1-19, January.
    3. Volodymyr Babich & Simone Marinesi & Gerry Tsoukalas, 2021. "Does Crowdfunding Benefit Entrepreneurs and Venture Capital Investors?," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 23(2), pages 508-524, March.
    4. Lauren Cohen & Christopher Malloy & Lukasz Pomorski, 2012. "Decoding Inside Information," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(3), pages 1009-1043, June.
    5. Grinblatt, Mark & Keloharju, Matti, 2004. "Tax-loss trading and wash sales," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 51-76, January.
    6. Gandal, Neil & Hamrick, JT & Moore, Tyler & Oberman, Tali, 2018. "Price manipulation in the Bitcoin ecosystem," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 86-96.
    7. Albert S. Kyle & S. Viswanathan, 2008. "How to Define Illegal Price Manipulation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(2), pages 274-279, May.
    8. Ronald C. Anderson & David M. Reeb & Wanli Zhao, 2012. "Family‐Controlled Firms and Informed Trading: Evidence from Short Sales," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(1), pages 351-386, February.
    9. Wilkoff, Sean & Yildiz, Serhat, 2023. "The behavior and determinants of illiquidity in the non-fungible tokens (NFTs) market," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    10. Brett Hemenway Falk & Gerry Tsoukalas & Niuniu Zhang, 2022. "Economics of NFTs: The Value of Creator Royalties," Papers 2212.00292, arXiv.org.
    11. Sun, Hanwen & Yin, Shuxing, 2017. "Information leakage in family firms: Evidence from short selling around insider sales," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 72-87.
    12. Meoli, Michele & Vismara, Silvio, 2021. "Information manipulation in equity crowdfunding markets," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    13. Hornuf, Lars & Schwienbacher, Armin, 2018. "Market mechanisms and funding dynamics in equity crowdfunding," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 556-574.
    14. Massoud, Nadia & Ullah, Saif & Scholnick, Barry, 2016. "Does it help firms to secretly pay for stock promoters?," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 45-61.
    15. Snehal Banerjee & Jesse Davis & Naveen Gondhi, 2018. "When Transparency Improves, Must Prices Reflect Fundamentals Better?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 31(6), pages 2377-2414.
    16. Rajesh K. Aggarwal & Guojun Wu, 2006. "Stock Market Manipulations," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 79(4), pages 1915-1954, July.
    17. Ahern, Kenneth R., 2017. "Information networks: Evidence from illegal insider trading tips," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(1), pages 26-47.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Goergen, Marc & Renneboog, Luc & Zhao, Yang, 2019. "Insider trading and networked directors," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 152-175.
    2. Vincenzo Butticè & Silvio Vismara, 2022. "Inclusive digital finance: the industry of equity crowdfunding," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 47(4), pages 1224-1241, August.
    3. Gandal, Neil & Hamrick, JT & Rouhi, Farhang & Mukherjee, Arghya & Feder, Amir & Moore, Tyler & Vasek, Marie, 2018. "The Economics of Cryptocurrency Pump and Dump Schemes," CEPR Discussion Papers 13404, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Lin William Cong & Xi Li & Ke Tang & Yang Yang, 2023. "Crypto Wash Trading," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(11), pages 6427-6454, November.
    5. Cumming, Douglas & Ji, Shan & Peter, Rejo & Tarsalewska, Monika, 2020. "Market manipulation and innovation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    6. Tsang, Kwok Ping & Yang, Zichao, 2022. "Do connections pay off in the bitcoin market?," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 1-18.
    7. Cumming, Douglas & Dannhauser, Robert & Johan, Sofia, 2015. "Financial market misconduct and agency conflicts: A synthesis and future directions," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 150-168.
    8. Sadok El Ghoul & Omrane Guedhami & Robert Nash & He (Helen) Wang, 2022. "Economic policy uncertainty and insider trading," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 45(4), pages 817-854, December.
    9. Silvio Vismara, 2022. "Expanding corporate finance perspectives to equity crowdfunding," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 47(6), pages 1629-1639, December.
    10. Chen, Shenglan & Ma, Hui & Wu, Qiang & Zhang, Hao, 2023. "Does common ownership constrain managerial rent extraction? Evidence from insider trading profitability," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    11. Massa, Massimo & Qian, Wenlan & Xu, Weibiao & Zhang, Hong, 2015. "Competition of the informed: Does the presence of short sellers affect insider selling?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(2), pages 268-288.
    12. Skare, Marinko & Gavurova, Beata & Polishchuk, Volodymyr, 2023. "A decision-making support model for financing start-up projects by venture capital funds on a crowdfunding platform," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    13. Alan D. Jagolinzer & David F. Larcker & Gaizka Ormazabal & Daniel J. Taylor, 2020. "Political Connections and the Informativeness of Insider Trades," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 75(4), pages 1833-1876, August.
    14. Yu Huang & Yao Cheng, 2015. "Stock manipulation and its effects: pump and dump versus stabilization," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 44(4), pages 791-815, May.
    15. Berkman, Henk & Eugster, Marco, 2017. "Short on drugs: Short selling during the drug development process," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 102-123.
    16. Vincenzo Butticè & Diego Useche, 2022. "Crowdfunding to overcome the immigrant entrepreneurs’ liability of outsidership: the role of internal social capital," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 59(4), pages 1519-1540, December.
    17. Kemme, David M. & McInish, Thomas H. & Zhang, Jiang, 2022. "Market fairness and efficiency: Evidence from the Tokyo Stock Exchange," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    18. Cumming, Douglas J. & Firth, Christopher & Gathergood, John & Stewart, Neil, 2021. "Covid, work-from-home, and securities misconduct," CFS Working Paper Series 666, Center for Financial Studies (CFS).
    19. Christian Leuz & Steffen Meyer & Maximilian Muhn & Eugene Soltes & Andreas Hackethal, 2017. "Who Falls Prey to the Wolf of Wall Street? Investor Participation in Market Manipulation," NBER Working Papers 24083, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Carole Comerton-Forde & Tālis J. Putniņš, 2014. "Stock Price Manipulation: Prevalence and Determinants," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 18(1), pages 23-66.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Blockchain; NFT; Manipulative Trading; Insider Trading; Wash Trading;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G28 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Government Policy and Regulation

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:116704. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.