CRYPTOPUNKS(Ͼ)

CryptoPunks is a collection of 10,000 unique 24×24 pixel art characters deployed on Ethereum mainnet on June 22, 2017 (block 3,914,495). Each punk is algorithmically generated — humans, apes, zombies, and aliens — with no two exactly alike.

Created by Larva Labs, a two-person studio run by Canadian software developers Matt Hall and John Watkinson, CryptoPunks was originally announced on r/ethereum on June 9, 2017 under the title "An experiment in digital collectibles on Ethereum." The post received a modest 25 upvotes. At launch, all 10,000 punks were free to claim — users only paid Ethereum gas fees. The entire supply was claimed within 24 hours.

The contract at this address is the second deployment of the CryptoPunks market. The original V1 contract contained a critical bug in the buyPunk function: it failed to transfer ETH to the seller after a purchase. Larva Labs identified the issue shortly after launch and deployed this corrected V2 contract, migrating all existing holders.

The contract manages punk ownership, listings, and a peer-to-peer marketplace with bids and offers — entirely on-chain with no intermediary. The image hash embedded in the contract (ac39af47...) verifies the canonical 24×24 sprite sheet containing all 10,000 characters.

CryptoPunks predates the ERC-721 standard (finalized January 2018) and implements its own ownership model. It is widely credited as one of the earliest NFT projects and a direct inspiration for the broader NFT movement. The collection was acquired by Yuga Labs in 2022.