Flying Tulip’s NFT options market tops $5M in volume, says Cronje

Andre Cronje’s Flying Tulip has a new metric to point to. Its marketplace for ftPUT NFTs has cleared over $5 million in cumulative trading volume, according to Cronje.

That figure matters because the product being traded is unusual. Buyers aren’t just picking up tokens. They’re buying tokens that come with a built-in exit, and it turns out people will pay extra for that.

How a put option ended up as an NFT

Flying Tulip applies that logic to its FT token. When investors took a primary allocation of FT, it came paired with a perpetual put option called an ftPUT. A put option is a contract that lets you sell an asset at a set price, regardless of where the market goes.

Here, that set price is $0.10. Holders can redeem their originally contributed assets at that level whenever they like. The option never expires.

The protocol packages each of these positions as an ERC-721 NFT, the standard Ethereum format for unique tokens. Wrapping the position this way makes it something you can hand to someone else.

That transferability is the whole point of the Perpetual PUT Marketplace. When someone buys an ftPUT NFT, they receive whatever FT tokens remain inside it, plus the redemption rights attached. Someone buying FT on the spot market gets the tokens alone, with no protective floor underneath.

The numbers behind the marketplace

The over $5 million cumulative figure is the headline stat. A snapshot from late June 2026 offers a closer look at activity.

By that point, the ftPUT marketplace had logged $1.6 million in trading volume across 279 sales. That works out to deals in the low thousands of dollars on average.

Pricing is the more revealing detail. The ftPUT NFTs were reported trading at premiums of 4-6% above their redemption value.

Beyond the marketplace, the broader protocol has its own figures. Recent updates put total value locked at approximately $20 million, with lending TVL described as nearly $20 million. The supply of ftUSD, Flying Tulip’s stablecoin, sits close to $4.75 million.

Background: Cronje’s bet on a full-stack exchange

Flying Tulip is pitched as a unified DeFi platform. It combines spot trading, lending, and perpetual futures with the ftUSD stablecoin in a single stack.

The project drew attention early through a high-profile private raise exceeding $200 million. Its token generation event was set for February 23, 2026, at a $1 billion fully diluted valuation.

FT’s design leans hard against the usual token playbook. Supply is fixed, and new tokens enter circulation only through primary capital allocation. There are no emissions and no team vesting schedules feeding new supply into the market.

Revenue from trading and options is directed toward open-market buybacks and token burns. The protocol is also expanding across multiple chains, including Ethereum and BNB Chain.

What this means for token launches and FT holders

Most token launches hand early buyers a simple choice: hold and hope, or sell. Flying Tulip adds a third path. A holder who wants out can sell the ftPUT NFT to someone who wants the protected position, without dumping FT onto the spot market.

The 4-6% premium also gives traders a useful signal to watch. If that premium widens, buyers are paying more for the protected version. If it narrows toward zero, the market is treating ftPUTs as little more than their redemption value.

The redemption mechanism also depends on the protocol’s ability to honor claims at $0.10. That makes the health of the underlying system, including its TVL and revenue, central to what the put is really worth.

Over $5 million in volume and 279 sales by late June 2026 suggest traders are treating these NFTs as financial instruments, not collectibles.