DOGE Barks Again—Are Meme Coins Making a Comeback?

Dogecoin (DOGE) is up 14.5% on the week, regaining ground amid a broader meme coin rally fueled by investors’ renewed appetite for risk-on assets. 

They have sent the meme coin category up 11% according to data provider CoinGecko, with other top tokens by market value Pepe and Shiba Inu rising more than 10% to claw back some losses and newer, popular tokens, SPX6900 and FARTCOIN, skyrocketing 70% and 104%, respectively over the last seven days. 

The surge has left meme coin proponents feeling more buoyant after a weeks-long slump, although other observers of the space believe that the tokens’ future is uncertain. They expect the meme coins, which reference pop culture and news events and are more volatile than other tokens, to change, and that investors will have to adapt.  

“I don’t think that you’re going to be able to consistently launch 30,000 tokens a day and think that there’s going to be this kind of crazy community of people or new people onboarded because of that,” said Joe McCann, founder of crypto fund Asymmetric, on the Unchained podcast. “There’s going to be some new implementation or innovation or iteration of what meme coins actually look like, and so that trade opportunity is what you should be looking for.” 

The total meme coin market cap has fallen to $58.7 billion according to CoinGecko. By comparison, dog-themed tokens, like DOGE and Shiba Inu, alone represented more than a $103 billion market cap on December 7. 

Yet meme coin analyzer Murad Mahmudov believes the category has huge potential, largely because it has yet to draw wider-spread awareness. 

“99.99% of people haven’t heard about SPX6900 yet,” posted crypto trader and meme coin analyzer Murad Mahmudov on X (formerly Twitter). “It will be everywhere. With the whole world wanting to join in. If you are here now, consider yourself lucky.”

Publicly, Mahumdov has remained adamant that his meme coin thesis, which revolves around finding cults of passionate individuals, will reward patient holders. 

Meanwhile, meme coin protocols continue to innovate. 

Last week, popular Solana token launchpad Pump.fun unveiled its own decentralized exchange (DEX) to try and improve the trading and migration experience for tokens launched on its platform. 

Other platforms, including decentralized exchange and DeFi platform Wasabi Protocol, have added features to improve the user experience. 

“We built Wasabi especially for times like this, where you need to hedge your bags and earn sustainable yield on them. At times like this users will benefit from innovation the most,” Eren, a pseudonymous core contributor to Wasabi told Decrypt. 

Eren said he expects meme coin sentiment, which declined partly due to a scandal involving the LIBRA token, to rise in the long run. 

“The appeal of meme coins and trading culture has always been their power to level the playing field,” he said. “But lately, celebrity-backed tokens have brought insider games back into the mix, siphoning value from the very community that gave meme coins life. In the long run, though, the trenches will wise up. Traders will adapt, learn, and continue trading what they genuinely find interesting.”

Pump.fun co-founder Alon Cohen noted that his company has created a product with the goal of being around in a decade and that meme coins are “here to stay.”

“Although the market has dumped and many people called for the end of meme coins, as soon as majors stopped going down, meme coin activity quickly stabilized and has been in an upwards trajectory,”he said.

Edited by James Rubin