Rarible Expands NFT Aggregator with ‘Non-Playable’ Token Rewards

NFT marketplace Rare announced today that it has launched a number of new features in a package it calls Rarible 2. It’s not an entirely new platform – but it is an expanded one that brings together listings from multiple marketplaces and also introduces new token rewards for traders.

Rarible co-founder Alex Salnikov described the launch to Decrypt as a “major milestone in the company’s timeline”, with changes not only to the platform’s interface, but also token rewards and governance, as well as NFT listings sourced from a wider range of other marketplaces.

The new Rarible.com aggregator indexes Ethereum NFT listings from four other marketplaces: OpenSea, LooksRare, X2Y2 and Sudoswap, allowing users to find more collectibles and artwork and potentially better prices. The Rarible.com marketplace still includes Rarible’s own listings, also handled by its own internal order book.

Previously just Rarible integrated listings from OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace by trading volume. Unlike traditional marketplaces, Sudoswap enables NFT trading through liquidity pools– but Salnikov told it Decrypt that the purchase experience for Rarible users will be the same as for the other aggregated platforms.

Rarible was the first NFT marketplace to launch its own token in 2020, with RARI used for both trading rewards and decentralized governance. Since then, marketplaces like LooksRare and X2Y2 have used reward tokens on a larger scale to try to attract users from other platforms and stimulate trading.

This approach has led to widespread wash trading – that is, manipulating trades to try to earn more token rewards in return. Often a user will trade an NFT back and forth between their controlled wallets at very high prices, a process that generated laundry trade for billions of dollars at LooksRare earlier this year.

Rarible is expanding its trading rewards with the launch of its enhanced marketplace, but Salkinov said the system is designed in a way that “cannot be gamed” by traders trying to maximize rewards, and will not be susceptible to laundering. trade manipulation. And some of the rewards are tied to paying royalties to the creator – one hot topic in the NFT area lately.

Buyers can earn RARI token rewards by purchasing an NFT from an aggregated marketplace that honors creator royalties, which means the seller pays additional fees (often between 5% and 10%) for each sale. The amount of tokens reward will be proportional to the royalty paid, up to a limit. Rewards will also be offered to users who purchase an NFT from a selection of projects each week that are considered RARI Rewards Collections.

RARI token holders will vote on which projects are eligible for rewards each week. And sellers can also share in these rewards: anyone who displays an NFT from one of these collections through Rarible will also receive token rewards. Rarible will also send RARI tokens to users who have purchased at least three NFTs through the marketplace from July 1 to September 30.

Rewarding royalties

By tying some rewards to paying royalties to creators on NFT purchases and others to a small, rotating selection of community-voted projects, Salnikov believes Rarible will successfully avoid the pitfalls its competitors face with less discriminatory token incentives.

“I think we’re the first to actually come to market with non-playable rewards,” he said. “Anything you get rewarded for is useful to other people. You can’t just do it to yourself. That’s a very big deal for us in defining this symbolic problem.”

Rarible’s initiative hits the spot a growing debate over whether marketplaces should respect creation fees. Most of the notable Solana NFT marketplaces (especially Magic Eden) have made payment of royalties optional. Sudoswap does not respect Ethereum royalties and they are optional for some projects on X2Y2.

In contrast, Rarible will continue to enforce royalties for NFTs listed through the order book, and only offer RARI token rewards for aggregated purchases where royalties are paid. “We believe that royalties are absolutely important,” Salnikov asserted, describing them as a “core innovation” of NFTs representing digital artworks, versus the traditional art market.

Collectively, the expanded aggregator and rewards are meant to drive loyalty to Rarible as well. Rarible does not charge an additional fee for aggregation – Salnikov said the feature is solely intended to make users more “comfortable” with using Rarible, and the marketplace can then benefit from the sale of NFTs listed naturally through its own order book.

As users earn RARI token rewards, they can lock in at least 100 RARI in one smart contract— that is, the code that powers autonomous decentralized apps — to earn extra benefits through a program called Rarible Prime. Under Prime, users pay no platform trading fees for Rarible-listed NFTs, and can vote on the weekly reward collections.

Salnikov said the rewards “cannot be gamed” in a negative way, but there is clearly some gamification to the way the model is designed. But it’s done in a way that’s meant to encourage users to keep trading, as well as participate in community governance – all in hopes of making Rarible their NFT destination over others.