From OGs like Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, and BONK to newbies like WIF and POPCAT, memecoins have turned heads and fattened wallets, transforming internet humour into serious market gains.

Why should you care? Because memecoins are no longer just about fun—they’re about serious returns.

They’ve proven their potential to disrupt markets, attract massive investor interest, and create wealth in ways no one could have predicted. If you want to stay ahead in the crypto game, understanding memecoins is no longer optional; it’s essential.

Welcome to Cryptonary’s State of the Memecoin Market Report – This report dives into the latest market performance, emerging trends, and investment strategies that will help you capitalise on this explosive sector. 

Whether you're a seasoned investor or a crypto newbie, get ready to uncover the secrets behind the most exciting and unpredictable corner of the cryptocurrency world.

Disclaimer: This is not financial or investment advice. You are responsible for any capital-related decisions you make, and only you are accountable for the results. "One Glance" by Cryptonary sometimes uses the RR trading tool to help you quickly understand our analysis. These are not signals, and they are not financial advice.

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Overview of the memecoin landscape

Since 2013, the development of memecoins has been very closely related to the development of the crypto industry as a whole.

The birth of memecoins: Dogecoin

Memecoins date back to 2013 when software engineers Billy Markus and Jackson Palmer created Dogecoin as a joke. The coin was based on the popular "Doge" meme featuring a Shiba Inu dog and was intended to poke fun at the hype surrounding cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. 

However, after its price jumped nearly 300% in value in 72 hours, rising from $0.00026 to $0.00095, and Dogecoin.com saw over 1 million visitors within the first 30 days, it became clear that memes definitely have a role to play in crypto. 

Second wave of memecoins

Ethereum debuted in 2015 with the promise of smart contracts, leading to the emergence of the ER-20 token standard and game-changing Web3 platforms like Uniswap. Ethereum’s success led to an explosion of new blockchain networks (smart contract platforms).  

During the initial waves of memecoins, the class of Doge memecoins had to launch their own PoW chains to exist. With the arrival of Ethereum, anyone could create a custom meme without first needing to build a blockchain network.

The introduction of smart contracts led to the creation of several new winning memecoins (e.g., Shiba Inu, Floki, SafeMoon, Pepe) – unsurprisingly, most of them were on Ethereum because of Ethereum’s dominance among smart contract platforms.

The third wave of memecoins

Over the years, Ethereum's scalability issues have become increasingly apparent, leading to the arrival of alternative smart contract platforms (e.g., Solana, Avalanche, BSC).

As these alternative platforms gained traction, communities formed around them, united by their shared belief in the potential of these networks to compete with Ethereum both from technological and community standpoints.

As expected, new memecoins have emerged across most of these third-generation blockchains to serve as a form of social currency and virality.

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The Lottery Effect: Why memecoins are captivating investors

The allure of memecoins lies in their potential for rapid, often unpredictable, yet massive price gains—a phenomenon we've dubbed "The Lottery Effect." This volatility has led many to draw analogies between investing in memecoins and playing the lottery. Both offer the tantalising prospect of significant returns from a relatively small initial investment. However, while the comparison captures some truth, it also oversimplifies the complexities of the cryptocurrency market.

The lottery analogy: Beyond pure chance

Unlike a lottery, where outcomes are determined solely by chance, investing in memecoins involves a blend of knowledge, skill, and strategy. While luck plays a role, smart investors can leverage market insights, trend analysis, and community sentiment to make informed decisions. Effective risk management is crucial in navigating the memecoin market, a skill set absent in the context of lottery tickets.

Profit potential: Luck and strategy

The potential for profit in memecoin investing is not solely luck-dependent. Investors can apply their understanding of market dynamics, engage with active communities, and capitalise on viral trends to enhance their chances of success. The unpredictable nature of memecoins creates opportunities for those who can read the signals and act decisively. This contrasts sharply with the lottery, where skill can’t influence the outcome.

Economic context: Hope amid deprivation

The rise of memecoins is closely tied to broader economic conditions, such as growing wealth disparity and inflation. Traditional investment avenues often seem inaccessible or offer limited returns, leaving many feeling hopeless about achieving financial stability. Memecoins, with their potential for quick, substantial gains, present an appealing alternative. They offer a glimmer of hope for those seeking to escape financial hardship and achieve wealth in a volatile economic environment.

Comparative odds: A better bet?

While investing in memecoins is undeniably high-risk, it arguably offers better odds than the lottery. The probability of winning a significant lottery prize is approximately 1 in 300 million, making it an exceedingly rare event. In contrast, the chances of realising substantial gains from memecoins, though still a long shot, are estimated to be around 1 in 700. This stark difference in odds underscores why memecoins have become an attractive speculative investment.

The appeal of memecoins

The popularity of memecoins can be attributed to their blend of high-risk, high-reward dynamics and the broader socio-economic context. They provide a platform for speculative investment that, while risky, offers a more accessible and potentially rewarding alternative to traditional financial instruments. As more individuals seek avenues for rapid wealth creation, the "Lottery Effect" of memecoins continues to drive their growing appeal in the cryptocurrency market.

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The current state of memecoins

Memecoins are largely driven by market sentiment rather than traditional financial metrics. The popularity, virality, and community engagement around a memecoin can significantly influence its value. 

In the past six months, memecoins have become the best-performing sector in crypto by a huge margin.

However, despite an explosion in the memecoin sector, the total market cap of top memes remains at around $60b, lower than the top of 2021, when the total memecoin market cap reached around $90b.

That means there is still untapped upside in this bull run. If the bull run is set to continue, we can expect further outperformance from memecoins.

OG memecoins

OG memecoins refer to the original or earliest examples of memes, which gained popularity and set the trend for many other memecoins. They have a relatively long history of existence with already established communities and liquidity.

The survival rate of memecoins is extremely low. Most suffer from extreme volatility and end up trending towards zero. History has shown that only a few can survive even one whole cycle. OG memecoins are the memecoins that have survived multiple cycles. They have repeatedly proven that they will not die as most memecoins.

If you are afraid of losing all your money in some random memecoin, OG memecoins are relatively safe choices for the memecoins supercycle.  

We believe there is at least a 10x upside for both DOGE and SHIBA if the memecoin supercycle is set to continue and things get silly.

Of course, 10x in the context of memecoins doesn’t sound exciting. However, the downside of these OG memecoins will be minimal.

The performance of OG memecoins

Looking at the performance of top OG memecoins, they have significantly underperformed majors since 2021 by a huge margin.

While BTC-ETH-BNB has been up around 4.2% since November 2021, DOGE-SHIB is still down almost 60% from its highs. 

But hold onto your hats, folks! While the OG memecoins may not always be the top performers in crypto, they have been delivering better returns than their more established counterparts in the last six months.

From the beginning of the year until the most recent local top, OG memes returned almost 2x that of major coins. While the OG memecoins are up over 100% in the last six months, the Top 3 is up 80%. 

However, this is after the recent market-wide risk-off move. As at the time of the recent local top, OG memecoins were up over 200% while majors were around 90%. 

These findings suggest that despite a lot of hype and talks about the memecoin supercycle, the real fun is yet to start. We are starting to see signs of strength; however, there is much more upside ahead.

The memecoin class of 24/25

Next, we have memecoins that have launched recently. These are expected to realise their full potential in the 24/25 cycle.

New and shinier tokens perform far better than old cycle coins. The same can be applied to the memecoin sector. These include dog coins like WIF, cat coins like POPCAT and SharkCat, and other animal coins such as Pepe and Hamster. We have covered a few winners: BONK, WIF and POPCAT. Moreover, we did a quantitative analysis to investigate whether WIF and POPCAT are good beta assets for SOL.

Our results showed that both WIF and POPCAT have a statistically significant beta for SOL, and their “beta coefficient” is higher than that of fundamental projects such as JUP. 

Moreover, data suggested that POPCAT has a higher beta than WIF, indicating while it is more volatile, it has a higher potential upside.

The performance of 24/25 memecoins

The performance of the memecoins 24/25 class has been impressive. The combined return of WIF, POPCAT, and PEPE has increased by an astonishing 10,000% (at the top) from the beginning of the year.

PolitiFi

Another class of memecoins that has emerged relatively recently are the Politi-Fi memecoins. These memecoins focus on political themes, particularly in the context of the upcoming US elections. 

These tokens, which often parody political figures or parties, have seen a surge in popularity.

The performance of PolitFi memecoins

The performance of the top PolitiFi memecoins is bittersweet. The major memecoins in this category delivered an astonishing 27,000% return at the local top, but they’ve now pulled back significantly.

 

The total market cap of Politifi memes has exceeded $1b, with hundreds of politically inspired memes trading on Solana and Ethereum.

We have been early into this narrative, highlighting Tremp and Boden as potential winners in the category.

With the US elections and presidential debates ahead, one would expect the narrative to continue getting stronger. However, PolitiFi memes took one of the biggest hits this week, and if the sector doesn't show signs of recovery, it might be at risk of a slow spiralling death.

NationFi

Another trend emerging is NationFi memes. The key selling point for this category of memecoins is that, unlike PolitiFi memes, they don’t have an expiration date.

Nationalist memecoins are driven by global populist movements and geopolitical tensions. Sports events such as the Olympic Games and Euro Cup heightened national pride, opening the door to speculation on memecoins that represent countries.

The great thing about this narrative is that political, cultural, and economic events between countries happen all the time. Therefore, some of these countries will always have something that can catch mainstream attention and fuel the meta.

The trend quickly gained traction and has resulted in several country-themed memecoins. 

However, we believe the trend still hasn’t reached its full potential, as the market cap of many NationFi memecoins is still tiny. However, we believe NationFi memes can catch a bid over time in geopolitical or geocultural events such as the Olympics or World Cups.

The performance of NationFi memecoins

The category is still very small, and we’ve covered the USA coin as a potential winner. It remains the top dog in the category, returning over 16,000% at the top over the last six months.

However, similar to PolitiFi memes, Nationalist memes have also suffered serious capitulation, and even the USA, the top performer, has given back most of its gains. If the sector doesn't show signs of recovery quickly, it might be at risk of a slow-spiralling death.

What does the performance of PolitiFi and Nationalist coins tell us about investing in memecoins? 

Outside of bluechip memes like DOGE, PEPE, BONK, and now WIF and POPCAT, most memecoins are short-term opportunities, and you should be intentional about taking profits.

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Insights into social sentiment

Memecoins thrive on community engagement. The success of memecoins like Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, and WIF can be attributed to their ability to create and maintain vibrant online communities. Therefore, social sentiment will always be important in gauging whether the memecoin sector as a whole (and also individual memecoins) is thriving or fizzling out.

Even though the whole memecoin sector is still far from ATH in terms of total market cap, the social sentiment metrics are still going strong. 

Google searches had explosive growth to track Bitcoin’s ATH in March before pulling back in like with the general market direction.

But social media commentary is where you’ll see the strongest trend, with interest in memecoins going almost vertical in the last six months.

Here, we can see that memecoins have been a hot topic on major social media platforms starting in December 2023.

Twitter remains the leading platform for social activity for memecoins with 75% share, while YouTube is next with 20% share.

Therefore, it is essential to focus attention on Twitter to monitor sentiment around memecoins. Right now, there is a slight decrease in memecoin content on social media, which coincides with a broader market-wide pullback.

Community engagement and internet culture

These communities are not just holders of the tokens; they actively participate in shaping the narrative and value of the memecoin. They conduct regular raids, promote the meme on social media, shoot viral videos, and try to capture the market's attention.

Internet culture plays a significant role in the success of memecoins. Memes, by their very nature, are designed to be shareable and engaging. 

Memecoins leverage this aspect by associating themselves with popular internet memes or jokes, thus creating a brand image that resonates with the online community. 

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Memecoins as a legitimate asset class

Despite a short-term decrease in sentiment, over longer timeframes, attention has confidently switched to memecoins, and the sector has established itself as a legitimate part of crypto. Institutional participation and lowering participation barriers are the two most significant factors that make a case for memecoins as a legitimate asset class.

Institutional interest and adoption

Historically, you would have been hard-pressed to find proof of institutional participation in memecoins as they consider them too risky and speculative. However, all that is changing as institutional meme coin holdings reached over $200 million in May, marking an over 220% increase since the start of the year.

Currently, institutions are bullish on memecoin, and their holdings show this with up to 5% allocation.

Pantera Capital’s Paul Veradittakit sees meemcoins as a Trojan Horse for crypto's onboarding of the next generation. He also sees them playing a crucial role in kickstarting network activity. Vitalik has argued that he would rather the crypto space swim with this current (of memecoins) rather than against it. 

The role of platforms like PumpFun

Increased demand has further fueled the memecoin craze. As a result, thousands of new memecoins launch every day. To be fair, the market is currently flooded with new memecoins, predominantly launched via PumpFun.

PumpFun is a platform that has played a significant role in the explosion of the memecoin. Previously, launching a memecoin required technical skills; mow, anyone can launch a token in 5 minutes. 

It is currently generating huge revenue from its memecoin strategy, comparable to platforms like Solana, Tron, and Ethereum.

Looking at PumpFun's product-market fit, a few other similar platforms have emerged: Hyperliquid now allows the creation of custom memecoin on its spot market, and WhalesMarket recently launched a memecoin launchpad as well.

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Composition of the memecoin market

The memecoin market is a diverse ecosystem, with various animal-themed coins vying for investor attention. While dog-themed coins have long dominated this space, recent trends show a shifting landscape, with cat coins gaining significant ground and other animal-themed tokens carving out their own niches.

The dominance of Dog coins

For now, most of the memecoins market is still represented by mostly dog coins with a collective market cap of $36b, representing more than half of the total memecoin market. 

The rise of Cat coins

However, cat coins have recently become more popular. The market cap of cat-themed memes rose from roughly $50m in January to over $1.8b over the last six months.

This rise can be attributed to the increased participation of Asian traders and investors. 90% of people between 18 and 39 in Asia invest in cryptocurrencies. Moreover, data shows that 80% of memecoin performance occurs in Asia trading hours.

Additionally, the substantial increase in the market cap of cats can be attributed to the massive underrepresentation of cats. Even today, after significant growth in cats' market cap, dogs are around 30x ahead of cats.

We can see from the graph below that their returns have been trending up and vastly outperforming dog coins. 

Since January, dogs have returned 2.5x, while cats have delivered a solid 10x. 

Other animals

While dogs and cats currently dominate the memecoin market, a diverse array of other animal-themed tokens are steadily gaining traction:

Frogs: Inspired by popular internet memes like Pepe the Frog, amphibian-themed coins have found a dedicated following.

Hamsters: Capitalising on the cuteness factor, hamster coins appeal to investors looking for the next adorable trend.

Apes: Riding the wave of the NFT boom and popular collections like Bored Ape Yacht Club, ape-themed coins have carved out a significant niche.

Other Creatures: From birds to rats, a wide variety of animal-inspired tokens continue to emerge, each hoping to capture a unique market segment.

Collectively, these "other animal" coins have shown impressive growth, returning around 4x since January. While less explosive than the cat coin market, this diverse category demonstrates the ongoing innovation and creativity within the memecoin space.

We see the trends outlined above as the most promising, with a decent chance of outperforming the general memecoin market.

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Worrisome trends

With the growing success of memecoins, we have observed some worrisome trends that are hurting retail users.

Scams and rug pulls

Traditionally, memecoins have been a sweet spot for many scams and rug pulls. The recent involvement of celebrities and VCs has only exaggerated the matter. 

Even though memecoins have gained legitimacy as an asset class, scams and rug pull are the main problems of this market that can hinder further adoption. 

Memecoins are, first and foremost, for the culture. However, many bad actors are just using retail as an exit liquidity and demonstrating the worst greed that markets have seen.

Celebrity coins

One concerning trend that has emerged is the active participation of “celebrities” in the memecoins market.

Celebrities with huge audiences are launching their memecoins and shilling them to their followers.

Some argue this practice can bring adoption and onboard many new people into crypto. However, what bothers us is that these memecoins are launching, and celebrities are using their followers as exit liquidity and dumping their coins on them. 

This is what the average celebrity coins’ performance looks like.

For example, this is a memecoin promoted by multiple Jui Jitsu world champion Dillion Danis.

The distribution of these celebrity coins often looks like this; most of the supply is controlled by insiders which inevitably leads to a rug.

On top of celebrities shilling low-quality and extractive memes, sketchy influences are doing the same.

Just look at how influencers are shilling one memecoin after another, dumping their bags on their followers. This is greed in its basest form.

This trend has caused many negative comments from communities and prominent figures in the industry. For example, Ethereum’s co-founder Vitalik Buterin spoke up against celebrities who use memecoins to dump on their following.

Buterin emphasised the importance of these memecoins having a meaningful purpose beyond just enriching celebrities or insiders. 

He suggested that memecoins could serve a public good, such as supporting healthcare, open-source software, or promoting art and creativity.

Founder of Solana’s top DEX Jupiter shared similar thoughts, suggesting that predatory and scammy memecoins launches are “annoying” and have to “disappear once and for all.”

Whether memecoins should have a meaningful purpose is a question to be debated. However, we agree with Ethereum and Jupiter’s founders that a constant dump on retail is not the way to mass adoption.

Knowing that there is a lot of crap on the memecoin market, what can you do about it?

Community and liquidity fragmentation

Many people faded our memecoin calls by not entering or not sizing properly for a chance to make life-changing money. But seeing the outperformance of memecoins, there’s now a frantic search for the next billion-dollar memecoin.

However, the game is constantly evolving, and it is becoming harder to gain an edge. For example, memecoin rallies used to happen at the tail end of bull runs to mark the top. Now, we are having memecoins show up early in the cycle and hold up better during market-wide selloffs than altcoins. 

Six months ago, you could gain an edge by taking positions in a memecoin when nobody was paying attention. Now, the chances of success with that strategy have drastically reduced with snipers all over the place and everyone buying memecoins as soon as they launch. Further, liquidity and attention fragmentation also create friction for newer memecoins to take off.

As thousands of memecoins launch daily and compete for attention, liquidity and communities are becoming increasingly fragmented. As a result, most memes struggle to gain meaningful adoption. 

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Memecoin investment strategy

As mentioned earlier, with so many VCs, influencers, and celebrities trying to extract as much value from retail as possible, making substantial money yourself is becoming a tough nut to crack.

However, if you want to take your chances and find the next life-changing memecoin investment, we have provided various guides, ranging from memecoin masterclass to our methodologies.

Besides doing basic rug checks, checking the community and socials, etc., one must have a strong pulse on the cultural trends to win in this game. That will be key to finding winners.

You are betting on virality and mindshare; therefore, you must grasp culture and internet memes to succeed at this game.

The safer option is to stick to Cryptonary’s picks; our most confident bets are on WIF and POPCAT.  

We are confident about WIF because it is a multibillion-dollar market cap meme. It has liquidity that makes it tradeable even when removing memeability factors like mindshare, virality and community. It is now an attractive tradeable asset with excellent distribution.

 Similarly,  POPCAT just got listed on one of the biggest exchanges, paving the way for more Tier 1 listings and establishing it as the first cat to billions in market capitalisation.

You may also look at PolitiFi memes and NationFi; the coins in those segments have taken a severe beating. You’ll be buying them at a massive discount, but there’s a higher risk that they may never recover from the current weakness. Unless we see capital flows and attention going back into PolitiFi and NationFi, we would be sceptical. 

Even with debates coming up or elections, PolitiFi could still suffer because news/events are not always catalysts; only when the market conditions are right, and right now, the market conditions are indicating a summer slumber. 

Barbell strategy

The Barbell Strategy helps balance stability with maximum upside potential by focusing on major cryptocurrencies (BTC, ETH, and SOL) on one end and memecoins (WIF and POPCAT) on the other. 

This approach allows you to benefit from established coins' stability and growth potential while capturing the explosive gains possible with high-risk, high-reward memecoins.

The essence of the Barbell Strategy lies in its dual approach. On one side, you have robust, time-tested assets like Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Solana (SOL). On the other end, the strategy involves a calculated allocation to high-risk memecoins like WIF and POPCAT. These coins offer the potential for astronomical gains, driven by virality and market sentiment. 

A word or two on macro

Macro controls everything, especially assets at the furthest point on the risk curve—memecoins certainly fall into that category. 

That means macro is essential to monitor to decide when to risk on and when to risk-off. It can guide when to ape into low-cap memecoins with 100x potential and when to play defensive.

For more detailed information, you can read Tom’s latest macro analysis, in which he illuminates the current macro environment and shares his thoughts on when to start aping memecoins and other risky assets.

As a result of macro, our picks have experienced pullbacks in recent months. However, we need to have a perspective. 

Despite the drawdown, WIF and POPCAT are up over 6000% and 800% respectively. BODEN, TREMP, POOWEL and USA are up significantly as well.

However, we all know the deal with meme coins – they’re wild and unpredictable, and part of the fun is riding out these big swings.

We are still up after a major pullback, which is a huge win for us and our users. We are still ahead. So, don’t let a little dip spook you. This is just another twist in the epic saga of meme coins.

Key tips for memecoin investing

• Stay informed: Keep up with the latest news and updates. At Cryptonary, we provide all the insights you need. Knowledge is power, folks.
• Avoid panic selling: Reacting to dips can mean missing out on the bounce back. Take a step back, breathe, and consider the overall picture.
• Diversify: Spread your investments to manage risk better. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.
• Stay reflexive: Memecoins are typically short-term plays. Be ready to adapt and not become too attached to any single investment.

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Projections and predictions

We also want to share projections on where memecoins are headed in the next 6 to 18 months.

First and foremost, we're confident that Cryptonary's winners will keep winning. In the next leg up, we are confident our picks will continue to dominate the memecoin market and deliver above-average returns.

However, although we favour new coins over old ones, we still see value in OG memecoins such as DOGE and SHIBA. We expect them to perform well; however, they underperform relative to our picks, such as WIF and POPCAT.

Our initial targets for WIF and POPCAT are $10 and $1.

However, if BTC reaches north of $175,000 and SOL north of $1000, we could see $75 for WIF and $10 for POPCAT.

Regarding top winners by chain, we see culture leaders emerging in the market. We see DOGE as the main memecoin for the Bitcoin community, PEPE as the main memecoin of the Ethereum community, and WIF as a flagship meme of the Solana community.

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Cryptonary’s take

So, let’s summarise the key findings from the report.

First and foremost, memecoins keep outperforming the broader market. Sentiment is strong even though the has been some drama among influencers and celebrities over Twitter.

However, despite many great developments, such as institutional adoption and massive interest, the total market cap of memes remains significantly lower than the 2021 cycle top, meaning there is still room for growth. 

Market dynamics are changing; what used to work in previous cycles is no longer applicable. However, competition among memecoins and the number of scams is heating up.

If in doubt, sticking to Cryptonary’s picks is the best strategy for successful memecoin investing.

We have identified several promising trends that help when investing in memecoins: OG memecoins and the memecoin class 24/25

However, we have also noticed some worrisome trends emerging: VC cabal memecoins and celebrity coins, both of which aim to extract as much value from retail as possible. Fragmented liquidity and communities are other issues that make investing in memecoins hard. 

The safest and potentially best solution is to follow Cryptonary.

The current macro environment presents another challenge, and we are not expecting any massive runs in the short term.

However, we believe Q4 will surprise many with significant returns, especially memecoin holders. The memecoin supercycle is in process, and we remain super bullish on Cryptonary memecoins.

🚀 The Memecoin Supercycle is Here – Are You Ready?

Memecoins aren’t just jokes anymore—they’re delivering life-changing returns. WIF and POPCAT have already made massive moves, and this is just the beginning.

At Cryptonary, we’ve helped 230,000+ investors navigate the crypto market and capitalize on explosive opportunities. Want to stay ahead of the game? Get exclusive insights, expert analysis, and top picks.

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