Over the last few weeks, there has been more than a little speculation around the nature and purpose of the B.20 buyout.

We get it. It is a fascinating feature, first introduced in some detail during the runup to Metapalooza. And now, with what can only be described as the blossoming of the B.20 ecosystem, there is renewed curiosity about the value of this experiment and therefore, interest in the buyout clause.

FAQs

You have questions. We have answers. Here’s a quick FAQ about the B.20 buyout.

1. Are you selling off the B.20 Bundle?

   No. This is not a sale. This is not an auction. The buyout clause is a smart contract feature that is going live. Metapurse is not selling off anything.

2. What is the B.20 buyout clause all about, then?

   It enables anyone that holds at least 1% of the B20 tokens to trigger an auction for the entire B.20 bundle.

3. More details about the auction itself, please?

   Sure. The auction will take place on b20.whalestreet.xyz. WhaleStreet engineered and fractionalized the B.20 bundle for us. All hail WhaleStreet. The auction will last 14 days. During this time, anyone can outbid the first bidder - outbids will stand for 3 days - or the community can veto the bid.

4. What is the minimum bid for the B.20 bundle, which contains not just the full set of Beeple’s 20 single edition pieces, but also prime real estate in Decentraland, Cryptovoxels, and Somnium Space, and additionally, the monuments/museums that house these works of art with original soundscape by 3LAU?

   The minimum bid when the contract goes live will be the Time Weighted Average Price (TWAP) of the B20 token over the week leading up to the contract going live, multiplied by 10 million, which is the total supply of B20. For instance, if the average price was, say, $10 over the week, the minimum bid would then be $100 mn.

5. When does the buyout contract go live? Didn’t you say March 3?

   The buyout contract will now go live during the third week of March. We wanted to make sure the contract was fully audited before release (it is now, by the champs at Quantstamp), with 100% branch coverage.

6. Back to the auction. Does the bidding have to be in B20, ETH, or some other currency?

   A combination of B20s and DAI. You begin with 1% of the total supply of B20s. The rest of the bid amount can be in DAI.

7. What happens if the bid wins?

   If the opening bid goes unchallenged, the auction comes to a close in 14 days, and the entire bundle belongs to the bidder. He/she can unlock the bundle and do with the assets what he/she will.

8. And what if he/she is outbid?

   The auction then ends in the next nine epochs (three days). Unless he/she is outbid again, in which case it is extended by another nine epochs.

9. Can the community veto the bid?

   Yes. We believe this is a powerful feature. If 12% of the B20s are staked in the contract, then the community effectively vetoes the bid. And the auction is reset, with a minimum bid now 8% over and above the previous bid.

10. A little more detail about staking B20s in the contract. Do the tokens need to be staked and unstaked for every bid?

    Not for every bid, no. Once the 12% mark is reached, the auction process is pretty much reset, with the minimum now 8% over and above the previous high bid. If another bid comes in over the new minimum, users have the option of either ‘continuing’ to stake their B20s or, with a transaction to the smart contract, take their tokens back.

11. What happens to B20 holders if a bid is successful?

    They get to redeem their share of the winning bid in DAI. They can redeem their share pro-rata, with their B20s.

12. Why the buyout idea? Why not just let things be?

    The buyout is not an endorsement or encouragement to sell the B.20 bundle. It is a smart contract feature that we believe needs to exist. If the idea of B20 is to provide exposure to the upside of premium NFTs, the buyout is only an extension of this intent as far as it can logically go.

All that said, if the past weeks have shown us anything, it is that our thesis about the value of NFTs is validated. Shared ownership of a superset of premium assets, swaddled in an experience like the B.20 monuments, is powerful. More so than individual NFTs within a bundle.

Anyone who owns high-value NFTs, or soon to be high-value NFTs, must think about how those NFTs are experienced or consumed. That experience layer is the secret sauce of the B.20 experiment. And we at Metapurse will use generous amounts of it in upcoming projects. You didn’t really think we’d stopped, did you?

This piece was edited on May 10 to update some numbers related to the buyout.