Dogecoin, Shiba Inu And Who Else? How Meme Coins Have Evolved Since The Last Bitcoin Halving

With the Bitcoin halving around the corner, Benzinga takes a look at how the meme coin landscape has changed since the last halving.

What Happened: According to CoinGecko data, the market capitalization of meme coins stands around $49.3 billion.

While countless meme coins are being launched on a daily basis, the top two players have remained unchanged since the last halving:

• Dogecoin DOGE/USD: Launched in December 2013, the meme coin leader has erased multiple zeros from its price, currently trading at $0.15, up 60% year-to-date. It is ranked eighth on the overall crypto board. Here is what happened to Dogecoin after the last Bitcoin Halving.
• Shiba Inu SHIB/USD:  Introduced as the “Dogecoin Killer,” Shiba Inu launched in August 2020, a few months after the last halving. Currently ranked second on the board, Shiba Inu is famously volatile, up 96% year-to-date and ranked eleventh among all cryptocurrencies.

The meme coin leaders may not have real-world utilities, but Shiba Inu has been consistently working on developing its token’s applicability and adopting token burns to reduce market supply and impact price movements. Meanwhile, the Dogecoin community is eagerly awaiting the coin’s adoption as a payment feature on X.       

Heavily-followed crypto trader Crypto Tony tweeted, "Memecoins really are ride to 0 or to the moon. Always enter expecting nothing back."         

Next in line are the $2 billion valuation meme coin club members:

• Dogwifhat WIF/USD: Introduced in December 2023 as a Shiba Inu dog wearing a hat, this meme coin has shot from zero to over $4 billion in the past six months. It reached the $1 mark within three months of its launch and quickly hit subsequent price thresholds up to nearly $5, outpacing the meme coin leaders that have yet to reach the $1 level.
• Pepe PEPE/USD: Launched in April 2023, this frog-themed coin stands out among the dog and cat coins. Not only has it been recently listed on leading exchanges, but it is also witnessing a significant increase in its holder base.

Following Shiba Inu’s lead in burning tokens as a marketing gimmick are:

• Floki FLOKI/USD, launched in July 2021, and Bonk BONK/USD, introduced in January 2023, have accumulated 275% and 1,450% gains respectively in the past year. Floki has burned around 59% of its total supply to date, while BONKBot revealed in an early April tweet that it has burned 256.8 billion BONK tokens so far.

Next is a community-driven AI project:

• CorgiAI CORGIAI/USD: Launched in July 2023, this token aims to expand and become the top community token in the Cronos ecosystem and beyond. It has seen a 563% gain in the past year, rapidly reaching its position in the top 10 meme coins.

The latest entrants in 2024 are:

• Brett BRETT/USD, Book Of Meme BOME/USD, and Cat in a Dogs World MEW/USD are the latest additions to the meme coin board, having launched in March 2024.

Also Read: How ‘Meme Coin Sausage Is Made,’ According To Crypto VC: ‘I May Be Everyone’s Exit Liquidity’

Why It Matters: While meme coins have generated skyrocketing returns since the start of 2024 amid what is being called the meme coin super cycle, the lack of utility and increasing number of scams raise concerns in the crypto community.

A CoinGecko report highlighted the meme coin narrative as the most profitable in the year’s first quarter, with the highest returns of 1312.6% on average across its top tokens. The report adds that the meme coin narrative was 4.6 times more profitable than the next best-performing crypto narrative, real-world assets.

With the upcoming Bitcoin Halving, analysts continue to predict a bull run in Bitcoin prices until the end of the year, potentially pushing altcoins, including meme coins, even higher.

What's Next: The influence of meme coins and Bitcoin as an institutional asset class are topics expected to be thoroughly explored at Benzinga's upcoming Future of Digital Assets event on Nov. 19.

Read Next: Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, Dogwifhat Among Top Picks For This Researcher’s ‘Meme Coin Supercycle’ Thesis

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