Above: A snapshot of Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs

Is unlimited minting of an NFT collection actually possible? NFT developer foobar has called attention to a Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) smart contract function that would allow a particular single, non-multi sig, wallet to mint an unlimited number of new Bored Apes which could potentially lead to a market shifting effect.

Currently, the contract allows for that wallet to mint up to 30 new Apes without a specific limit set on the number of mints. Therefore, the wallet can continue to mint new Apes indefinitely as long as they are able to pay the gas fees required for minting.

BAYC’s refusal to act upon this for over a year

Hey thanks, we were just talking about this. Obviously, we're never going to call that function again and we're planning on revoking ownership in the next day or two.

— Bored Ape Yacht Club (@BoredApeYC) June 2, 2021

In 2021, NonFungibles founder Dan Kelly has inquired about BAYC’s plan about for this function. Although BAYC mentioned that they will deal with this function, they have not taken action and nothing has changed for over a year.

Crypto community’s reaction

the externally owned single-signer account that has the authority to mint arbitrarily more apes, 0xaBA7161A7fb69c88e16ED9f455CE62B791EE4D03, is still active. the last transaction was 16 hours ago

— suzuha ⚡🌙 (@dystopiabreaker) February 3, 2022

News of the possibility that new Bored Apes could be minted are met by strong reactions from members of the crypto community.

One user has sounded off that the wallet which has access to mint multiple new Bored Apes was still active as of February 3, 2022. This could potentially lead to the user of that wallet changing the metadata associated with each existing ape if more new Bored Apes are minted.

Another user took this opportunity to troll the parent company of Bored Ape Yacht Club, Yuga Labs, saying that they would handle this issue “the same way they take good care of their discord”. Eluding to the recent breach in the Bored Ape’s discord channel which led to the loss of millions in NFTs.

Worry not, daddy yuga will take good care of the key, just like they take good care of their discord 💪

— 𝕊.Clarke ⚛️🌎🌑 (@LuizClarke) June 5, 2022

That said, Bored Apes isn’t the only NFT project with this particular function. A similar function was also found by software engineer, Ethan Hunsaker, in the Doodles smart contract which is another blue chip NFT collection.

What are the effects of this function?

The main concern regarding this contract function is the possibility that the wallet could be hacked. If so, the scarcity of Bored Ape NFTs would be affected and the creation of new Apes could affect their value.

Keir Finlow-Bates, CEO and founder of Chainfrog also believes that although the creation of new Apes could drive the value of Bored Ape NFTs down, it is not a certainty. The newly minted Apes could potentially be more valuable than the original collection.

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