Alexis Ohanian, Serena Williams and CryptoPunks: What Is Verified

Alexis Ohanian is best known as a co-founder of Reddit, the social news and discussion platform. He is also an investor, and he has been married to tennis champion Serena Williams since 2017. Public interest in the couple is high, and many searches pair their names with questions about money, parenting and collecting.

Recent public comments show how he talks about her. In one post, he said he has seen over the last several years how much people love his wife and what she means to so many people around the world, and he described it as unlike anything he had seen. That kind of statement is a primary source worth quoting directly rather than paraphrasing with extra detail.

Other coverage has a lighter tone. Commentary has picked up moments where he joked about Serena being his mother's favorite athlete or about his own competitive streak. Those pieces are entertainment writing, so treat them as reports of what was said rather than as a full record of his views.

Why does this matter for an NFT guide? The question that brings most readers in is whether he owns collectibles tied to her. Answering that requires separating three things: what he has said himself, what outlets have reported, and what can be checked on a blockchain. The sections below take those in order.

Several outlets have reported that Ohanian collects Serena Williams cards. A 2021 article said he had revealed an investment in NFTs and had built up what it described as the largest collection of Serena Williams cards in the world. A December 2024 article said he was not focused on owning the most cards of her but wanted to collect enough for his children.

Treat these as secondary sources. Headlines can overstate a collection, and a claim about being the largest is hard to verify because no independent registry tracks private holdings. The safest reading is that he has publicly discussed collecting cards connected to his wife, and that collecting is part of his wider interest in digital and physical memorabilia.

A useful way to review these reports:

• Note the publication date, because collecting plans change over time.
• Check whether the outlet quotes him directly or relies on a video clip or a summary of an interview.
• Look for a primary source, such as his own posts or a full interview transcript.
• Compare the reported claim with what the source actually says. The trading-card and NFT references in the results come from 2021 and 2024 articles. None of them confirms a specific current holding.

The results reviewed for this guide do not mention a count of CryptoPunks, so that detail should be treated as unverified until a reliable source supports it.

The claim that Ohanian owns six CryptoPunks that resemble Serena Williams does not appear in the sources reviewed for this guide. None of public reporting names CryptoPunks, the number six, or a link between a specific punk and Williams. Repeating the claim as fact would be a guess.

Checking a claim like this is possible in principle, because CryptoPunks are an Ethereum collection and ownership is recorded on a public ledger. In practice, you would need:

• A wallet address that is publicly tied to Ohanian, such as one he has posted or verified himself.
• A block explorer lookup of that address to see which tokens it holds.
• Confirmation that the holdings match the collection's official contract, not a similarly named one.

Even with a wallet in hand, a picture cannot tell you intent. A punk that looks like someone is an artistic judgment, and fans often make resemblance claims that the owner has never endorsed. Avoid attributing a likeness to a person unless a source you can cite makes that link.

Be careful about privacy too. Tracing a private person's wallet and publishing it, or guessing which address belongs to someone, can expose them to scams and harassment. A safer rule is to rely only on information the person has made public.

CryptoPunks are a collection of 10,000 pixel-art characters on the Ethereum blockchain. They were created by Larva Labs in 2017 and are among the earliest widely known NFT collections. Each character is built from traits such as hair, glasses, accessories and skin tone, and some traits appear far less often than others.

Collectors value them for several reasons. They are old by NFT standards, they hold an important place in the history of the medium, their designs are instantly recognizable, and a large community has grown around them. Larva Labs sold the project's intellectual property to Yuga Labs in 2022, which is part of the public record.

Prices for CryptoPunks move with the wider NFT market and with the level of interest in the collection. Because prices change often, do not rely on any figure from an older article. Check current listings and recent sales on a marketplace or block explorer, and note the date you looked.

Key terms to know:

• Floor price: the lowest current listing in a collection.
• Trait rarity: how often a feature appears across the whole set.
• Token ID: the unique number of one item within the collection.

Ownership of a token does not automatically settle how artwork can be used. Terms vary by project, so read any licence attached to the collection before using images commercially.

Verifying NFT ownership follows the same general steps for any collection:

1. Identify the exact collection. Use the official contract address published by the project rather than a name search, since fake collections often copy famous names.
2. Open that contract on a reputable block explorer for the chain it lives on.
3. Look up a wallet address. The holdings tab shows tokens, and each token ID links to its metadata and transfer history.
4. Check the transfer history. Purchases and transfers appear as on-chain events with timestamps, which show when an item moved.
5. Confirm any name attached to a wallet through a source you trust. Ethereum name service names can help, but a name is only as reliable as the person who set it and the sources that link it.

Ownership can change within seconds. A holding you see today may have been sold tomorrow, so date-stamp your notes and recheck before drawing any conclusion. If you are writing about a holding, say when you checked it and how you confirmed the wallet's link to the person.

Block explorers are read-only tools. They show what is on the ledger but cannot tell you whether a listing is legitimate or whether the seller has rights to the artwork. Those questions need separate checks against the project's official channels.

Serena Williams cards exist in physical form and in digital form, and the two work differently. Physical trading cards are held by the owner or a grading service, and their value depends on condition, grade, print run and demand. Digital NFTs record ownership on a blockchain, but the underlying card still depends on the issuer's licence and the platform's terms.

Feature	Physical graded card	Digital NFT card
Proof of ownership	Physical possession and grading label	Wallet holding the token
Storage	Home, safe or vault	Your wallet and the platform
Main risks	Damage, counterfeits, grading disputes	Phishing, smart contract issues, platform failure
Resale	Auction houses, dealers, marketplaces	NFT marketplaces

Some platforms combine both formats, holding physical cards in insured vaults and issuing digital tokens that represent them. Courtyard is one example of this model in the dApp directory. Before buying, ask what backs each token, who holds the physical item, what insurance covers, and what happens to the tokens if the platform stops operating.

Fees, custody terms and redemption rules differ between platforms. Read them in full, and compare the total cost of buying and later selling, not only the listed price.

Scams often use the names of famous people to attract attention. A post or message claiming to come from a celebrity and asking for funds, wallet access or a "verification" step is almost always fake. Protect yourself with habits that apply to any collectible purchase:

• Bookmark official sites and check the address each time before you connect a wallet.
• Never share a seed phrase or recovery phrase with anyone, including people who claim to be support staff.
• Use a hardware wallet for valuable holdings where that is practical for you.
• Review token approvals and revoke any you no longer need, using a reputable tool.
• Be wary of unsolicited direct messages offering mints, giveaways or account checks.
• Compare prices across more than one venue, and be cautious with listings far below the recent floor price.
• Keep records of purchases, transfers and sales. Tax treatment differs by country, so check with a qualified adviser for your situation.

If something feels rushed, pause. Legitimate sales rarely require you to act within minutes, and genuine projects publish their contract addresses and support channels openly.

Because holdings, prices and public statements change, the most reliable approach is to check primary sources and date-stamp what you find. Useful places include the person's own verified accounts and full interviews, the official pages of any collection, and block explorers for on-chain records. For reported events, use established news outlets and compare their details.

The key facts in this guide, in short:

• Ohanian has publicly praised his wife and discussed collecting her cards, according to the reports reviewed.
• The reports from 2021 and 2024 are secondary and dated, so they do not establish a current holding.
• The six CryptoPunks claim is not supported by the sources reviewed and should not be repeated as fact.
• Any ownership claim can be checked on a blockchain, but only with a wallet that is publicly linked to the person.

If you want to explore NFT collecting yourself, start with a platform that matches your goal. Stargaze is a community-owned app chain with its own marketplace and launchpad. NFTX offers a different model, letting users trade NFTs against a vault-backed pool. Whichever you choose, compare fees, check contract addresses and start with an amount you can afford to lose.