This week’s featured collector is lvagencyinc
lvagencyinc focuses on AI generated NFT art. Check it out at lazy.com/lvagencyinc
Last week’s poll was a little humbling in the best way. 60% of you said NFT art is “back” only when collectors return with conviction—not flipping, not dabbling, but actually building collections again. Museum adoption came in second at 30%, and only 10% cared most about “healthy, boring markets.”
The smartest signal is what got 0%: a breakout artwork and a new onchain format. That reads like fatigue with “the next big thing” narrative. A single masterpiece or a clever mechanic isn’t enough if the social layer isn’t there to carry it. You’re basically saying the medium doesn’t revive through novelty—it revives through patronage.
And the museum vote being half of the collector vote is interesting too: institutions matter, but they’re not the trigger. In this audience’s view, museums can validate what’s already happening—but they won’t substitute for a living collector culture that supports artists week after week, not just at the top of a bull cycle.
No Retrial: The First Major NFT Insider Trading Case Is Over
The U.S. Department of Justice has officially closed the book on the most famous early “insider trading” case in NFTs: Nathaniel Chastain, the former OpenSea employee accused of buying NFTs before they were featured on OpenSea’s homepage and then flipping them for profit.
This week, prosecutors told a Manhattan federal court they won’t retry the case, after Chastain’s conviction was overturned last year. Instead, the government and Chastain reached a one-month deferred prosecution agreement. If that month passes without issues, the DOJ says it will dismiss the charges.
Why end it now? In a letter to the court, Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton (who previously chaired the SEC) said the decision reflected, in part, the fact that Chastain already served three months in federal custody and forfeited 15.98 ETH—about $47,000—which prosecutors said represented proceeds from his NFT trades. Chastain agreed not to challenge that forfeiture. Clayton’s bottom line: at this point, the government believes “the interest of the United States will be best served” by ending the prosecution rather than fighting for a retrial.
If you were around in 2021, you probably remember why this case mattered. Chastain worked at OpenSea and was accused of using advance knowledge of which collections would get front-page placement to buy in quietly and sell after the exposure. Prosecutors said he used anonymous wallets and burner accounts to make at least 15 trades between June and September 2021, earning around $57,000. A jury convicted him in May 2023 on wire fraud and money laundering charges, and the case was widely framed as the first big precedent for “NFT insider trading.”
Then came the reversal. In July 2025, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the conviction, agreeing with the defense that the information Chastain used—homepage placement decisions—didn’t clearly qualify as “property” under federal wire fraud law. In other words, the court’s view was that the jury was effectively asked to punish unethical behavior as if it were criminal fraud, without the government proving the kind of misappropriated “property interest” the statute requires. Judge Steven Menashi (who oversaw the case) captured the core idea: deceptive behavior may be wrong, but it isn’t automatically wire fraud unless it involves a demonstrable property interest at stake.
With the case now being closed, Chastain is also eligible to seek return of the $50,000 fine and $200 special assessment he paid after the 2023 conviction.
It’s also worth noting what didn’t happen here. At one point, prosecutors explored whether OpenSea itself could face consequences for Chastain’s actions. They ultimately concluded the company acted quickly—investigated, asked for his resignation, and cooperated with authorities.
Zooming out, this fits a broader trend: U.S. regulators have been stepping back from their most aggressive crypto enforcement posture since late 2024, moving away from the “regulation-by-enforcement” approach that defined the prior era. The SEC, for example, ended its investigation into OpenSea last year, including a Wells Notice that alleged OpenSea was offering NFTs as unregistered securities. After shifts in leadership and priorities, that case was dropped.
For NFT collectors, the takeaway isn’t “anything goes.” It’s that the first wave of NFT law is still wrestling with basic definitions: what counts as “property,” what counts as misappropriation, and where exactly the line sits between bad behavior and criminal fraud. Markets can evolve faster than statutes—and this case is a reminder that a lot of the legal framework around NFTs is still being negotiated in real time.
Poll: What’s the biggest thing holding NFT art back right now?
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