Eminem, one of the best-selling music artists of all time and the only rapper to have ever won an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song, has joined the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) with his first ape purchase that cost 123.45 Ether (worth $452,000 or roughly Rs. 3.36 crore). The rapper, who’s bagged numerous American Music Awards and 15 Grammy Awards thus far, has set the Ethereum-based ape as his profile picture on Twitter and has reportedly collected at least 15 non-fungible tokens (NFTs) so far on the most popular NFT marketplace OpenSea.

The graphic, dubbed “EminApe”, shows the signature Bored Ape figure dressed in a khaki army cap and a gold chain necklace, both often worn by Eminem in real life. The digital artwork was sold by BAYC member GeeGazza. GeeGazza took to Twitter later announcing that the sale becoming a reality is “madness”. “I’m living in a simulation,” he added. The BAYC member has been trying to get Eminem to buy “EminApe” off him for months now. Back in November, GeeGazza tweeted, “I still think Eminem is destined to buy my Bored Ape one day.” He also admitted, “You don’t understand how long I’ve been manifesting that Eminem buys my ape.”

Meanwhile, as first reported by Decrypt, the credit for the sale has been claimed by a digital agency named Six, although this is hardly Eminem’s first foray into NFTs. According to Dappradar, the rapper owns 166 NFTs from 32 collections.

Eminem released his first set of NFTs through Nifty Gateway back in April 2021. The collection raised just short of $1.8 million (roughly Rs. 13.38 crore). It featured digital action figures, characters from iconic Eminem videos, Mathers’ original instrumental beats, and rare physical items.

The NFT space has attracted many musicians this year and BAYC and Mutant Ape Yacht Club (MAYC) NFTs sit on top of the popularity chart, but Eminem is arguably the biggest star to participate in the movement to date.

With his new ape, Eminem has officially joined the second-largest NFT project on OpenSea by volume, joining the likes of NBA star Stephen Curry and talk show host Jimmy Fallon.

The sale also saw BAYC and MAYC NFT sales skyrocket. Metrics indicate that on the day after the news of Eminem’s new ape purchase broke out, MAYC’s seven-day trade volume of $93.02 million (roughly Rs. 692.86 crore) is up 93.41 percent and BAYC’s weekly volume of $78.26 million (roughly Rs. 581.81 crore) is up 150.97 percent.