Who was defrauded? “Journalists” and “journalism” websites want clickbait.

The whole purpose is to give the “journalist” just enough plausible deniability to write a clickbait headline, which benefits CNBC/BBC and the person selling within their family.

As far as I know, misleading “news” is not illegal.

No-one needs to be defrauded to make out an offence of Fraud in the UK.

"Fraud by false representation" happens when someone dishonestly makes a false representation with the intent to make a gain for themselves or another. Making up a news story to flip NFTs would almost certainly amount to a crime of fraud by false representation.

it's fake news

Yes it's called Painting the Tape and is illegal in the US and prohibited by the SEC: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/paintingthetape.asp

Does this apply to cryptocurrencies?

most cryptocurrencies are considered securities, so yes. but this is an NFT. not sure where things stand there, but if they are being traded like currencies, then my bet is on NFTs being securities too.

not yet

You say that like the finance world would never commit fraud or securities crime, even when given an unregulated market to work with.

I don't know how I "said that like" anything. I was just expressing curiosity about the legality of the described behavior.