ApeCoin (APE), the utility and governance token of the APE ecosystem which was built by Yuga Labs to expand the utility of its Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) non-fungible token collection, has been struggling recently.
APE/USD has been unable in recent weeks to muster a sustained pushback to the north of its 21-Day Moving Average (DMA), which has been acting as resistance going all the way back to April.
APE was last trading near $2.20 per token, within familiar ranges over the past month.
But the token is unlikely to be able to replicate the positive general performance being seen elsewhere in the crypto market, such as with bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH).
That’s because NFT markets, including the price of BAYC collection, are performing badly right now, reducing demand for the NFT-linked APE cryptocurrency.
The poor performance of the NFT market has a lot to do with a recent drama relating to a recently launched Azuki NFT collection.
The Azuki NFT collection creators raised a stunning near $40 million in their new launch, but some big investors claimed that they had been ripped off, as the newly launched collection looked very similar to a past collection.
These big investors bandied together to form the so-called Azuki DAO (decentralized autonomous organization), which they are using to put pressure on Azuki’s creators for a refund.