Celebrity NFTs Risk ‘Catastrophic Failure.’ Just Ask John Cena

Celebrities like the musician Grimes have been quick to cash in on nonfungible tokens, making millions from minting collections of their own digital art.

For buyers, however, the payoff has been far less rewarding.

Consider “Earth” -- one of several NFTs issued by Grimes in February. Depicting a cherub spearing the globe, perhaps in a reference to her baby with SpaceX’s Elon Musk, it was part of a collection that netted the artist (whose real name is Claire Elise Boucher) about $5.8 million after selling out in 20 minutes. While the cost to originally own one of the 303 ...