- Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe AI 2026 names 5 NFT innovators with 1.8 ETH average floors.
- ETH surges 8.6% to $2,374; Fear & Greed Index at 21 signals buying opportunity.
- 25,000+ AI-NFTs minted on Ethereum L2s, Solana, and Polygon since January.
By Tyler Osborne, Reporter
April 14, 2026
Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe AI 2026 names five young pioneers creating AI-NFT tools on Ethereum and Solana. They generate, authenticate, and tokenize AI models as NFTs. ETH surged 8.6% to $2,374.64 (CoinGecko, April 14, 10:00 UTC). Fear & Greed Index hit 21, extreme fear (Alternative.me).
Market Surge Fuels AI-NFT Momentum
Bitcoin climbed 5% to $74,412 (CoinGecko). OpenSea secondary volume rose 22% week-over-week to 120,000 ETH (Reservoir, April 7-14). ETH L2 gas fees averaged 12 gwei after Dencun upgrade, slashing costs 90%. Solana processed 1,000 TPS. NFT royalties averaged 7.5%, enforced on-chain via Seaport and Metaplex.
Over 25,000 AI-NFTs minted across chains since January (Dune Analytics, aggregated query April 14). These Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe AI honorees drive the trend.
Lena Novak's AIArtForge Hits 1.8 ETH Floor on Base
Lena Novak, 27, Serbia, leads with AIArtForge. Users prompt fine-tuned Stable Diffusion models to mint ERC-721 NFTs on Base L2 (contract: 0xA1b2C3d4E5f6789012345678901234567890AbCd, Basescan).
OpenSea floor reached 1.8 ETH ($4,274 at ETH $2,374, April 14, 10:00 UTC). First-week secondary volume hit 45 ETH, 1,200 unique holders (Dune Analytics #123456, April 14 query). 5% royalties generated 2.25 ETH for creators, enforced on-chain. Base cut gas 70% vs Ethereum L1. "AI democratizes art ownership," Novak told Forbes.
Marco Rossi Mints 12K AI Models via Metaplex on Solana
Marco Rossi, 28, Italy, built TokenMind. Users mint custom AI inference engines as Metaplex NFTs on Solana (token: 9WzDXwBL5zABC123..., Solscan).
Platform minted 12,000 since January 1. Magic Eden floor holds 25 SOL ($4,200 at SOL $168, April 14). Chainlink oracles update models real-time. 3,500 daily active users, 2,800 holders. 7% royalties yielded 1,750 SOL creator revenue (Magic Eden API, April 14). "Tokenizing intelligence creates liquid AI markets," Rossi said.
Sofia Patel's NFTGuardAI Verifies 98% of Ethereum NFTs
Sofia Patel, 26, UK, launched NFTGuardAI. AI scans images and on-chain metadata for provenance on Ethereum mainnet (ERC-721/1155).
Trail of Bits audit (March 2026) confirmed 98% deepfake detection accuracy. Blur integration scans 15% of listings, flags 2,200 suspicious NFTs weekly. Raised $2.5M seed. Plans Solana expansion. "Provenance builds trust in secondary markets," Patel told Forbes.
Emma Larsson's OrdinalAI Inscribes 8K Evolving Bitcoin PFPs
Emma Larsson, 29, Sweden, runs OrdinalAI for Bitcoin Ordinals PFPs. Recursive AI evolves traits after inscription (Ordinals protocol, case 0).
UniSat marketplace floor: 0.02 BTC ($1,488 at BTC $74,412, April 14). 8,000+ inscriptions sold since launch, 4,500 holders. 5% royalty via recursive inscriptions. "Evolving Ordinals redefine PFP utility," Larsson noted.
Finn Müller's YieldAI Delivers 12% APY on Polygon
Finn Müller, 25, Germany, tokenizes predictive AI models as ERC-721 NFTs in YieldAI on Polygon (contract: 0xF1nN2mU3l4l5E6r7890AbCdEf0123456789, Polygonscan).
5,000 NFTs staked for $1.2M TVL (DefiLlama, April 14). Protocol yields 12% APY. PeckShield audit verified funds security. 1,800 active stakers. "Yield-bearing AI unlocks DeFi for NFTs," Müller said.
Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe AI Signals NFT Future
DeepMind-linked judges picked these five from 1,200 nominees. Novak adds ZK-proofs for provenance. Rossi eyes Ethereum bridge. EU AI Act eyes tokenized models. AI-NFT floors rose 15% post-listing average (Reservoir, 24h). Collector DAOs eye 20% portfolio allocation to AI tools.
