This week, there’s been more controversy as insiders allegedly invested thousands of dollars in the token FOCAI and walked away with tens of millions of other people’s hard-earned cash.
TL;DR
- Controversy around insiders making big money
- Meme coins are back in the spotlight
- Elon Musk changes his name and avatar
- Solana outperforms Ethereum and Base combined
- Vitalik Buterin donates $1M USDC to his biotech fund
Intro
This week, there’s been more controversy as insiders allegedly invested thousands of dollars in the token FOCAI and walked away with tens of millions of other people’s hard-earned cash.
Source: IG
While many accounts on X report that Base is dominating, the statistics show otherwise as Solana reports new record highs.
While most of the mindshare recently has been concentrated on AI, MemeFi as a sector is gaining strength. Are people getting bored of AI agents already and wanting to ape meme coins again with no utility and empty promises?
7-Day Meme Coin Market Snapshot
The overall meme coin market cap is up by over 2% from $114 billion to just over $116 billion over the last seven days as CT (Crypto Twitter) went from scared to bullish in no time. The TradFi bros will never understand.
The top meme coins are on a gradual but clear uptrend. Supercycle (real)?
Source: CoinMarketCap
Meme coins and culture are still very much alive and well. Poe posted a picture of himself with a baguette on the beach and the degenerates asked for the CA. IYKYK.
As usual, just as everyone calls for $80K, Bitcoin blasts past $100,000, and the other crypto majors, Ethereum, Solana and XRP, joined the party! The party did not last long though, and quickly got rejected.
Source: CoinMarketCap
Meme Coin Market vs Other Crypto Sectors
DeFiLlama's Narrative Tracker showed that memes came fourth this week, outperformed by AI which is the center of attraction at the moment. I wonder how long this will last as SPX6900 surpasses a $1.5 billion market cap.
The 30-day trajectory continued its upward trend as Murad calls it our last chance before AI takes over.
Source: DeFiLlama
Top 20 Meme Coin Leaderboard
Meme coins recovered extremely well but then dumped as Bitcoin corrected over the last week.
Source: CMC Meme Coins Page
Meme Coin Charts: 7-Day Insights
The star of the week must be SPX600 as it outperformed AI agents like ai16z, which has dropped out of the top 20 meme coins by market cap.
Biggest Gainers (Last 7 Days):
- SPX6900 (SPX): +52.48%
- Mog Coin (MOG): +12.18%
- Dogecoin (DOGE): +9.87%
- Brett (BRETT): +9.50%
- Pudgy Penguins (PENGU): +5.45%
Biggest Decliners
- Goatseus Maximus (GOAT): -15.60%
- Peanut the Squirrel (PNUT): -11.75%
- Popcat (POPCAT): -9.22%
- Pepe (PEPE): -9.19%
- BOOK OF MEME (BOME): -7.40%
Meme Coins by Chain
Solana Memes
- Act I: The AI Prophecy (ACT) soars by 22% while they announce a grant to @GnonOnSolana.
- Gigachad (GIGA) is up 9.87% as they celebrate their birthday.
Ethereum Memes
- SPX6900 soars by almost 57% with breaking news.
- PEPE drops by 3.96% after Elon Musk changes his profile photo and X page name so he is not Kekius Maximus anymore.
Tron Memes
- SUNDOG is up by 10% while their cult is growing.
- Justin Sun goes all in AI. Top signal?
Most Tron meme coins have low market caps compared to tokens on chains like Ethereum and Solana, so they are extremely risky until proven otherwise.
SUI Memes
- TARDI leads the pack and gains 45% as they win the Meme Madness competition. Ngl, their art is pretty sick!
- LOFI goes up by 27% while they keep cooking.
Base
- Akuma Inu continues its space mission, soaring by 300%, and Matt Wallace sees the potential.
- Henlo surges by 165% and the HENLO TGE and drop will happen in the first days of the Berachain mainnet
- Based Pepe rises by 37% as Base gains traction.
Bitcoin Runes
- DOG gains 10% and reaches 100,000 holders.
- WAM is up 15% while they tease six new products.
Most Bitcoin Runes have low market caps compared to tokens on chains like Ethereum and Solana, so they are extremely risky until proven otherwise.
Meme Coin News
Vitalik Buterin Donates
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin recently transferred nearly $1 million in Circle’s USDC stablecoin to his biotech fund, Kanro, as part of his philanthropic efforts.
While his sales fund philanthropy, they often lead to sharp price declines for the tokens involved. For instance, the value of DINU, one of the meme coins sold, dropped 68% after the swap.
Solana 24-Hour DEX Volume
The Solana network has outpaced Ethereum and its layer-2 scaling solution Base in 24-hour decentralized exchange (DEX) trading volume, according to DefiLlama.
On Jan. 6, Solana-based DEXs recorded nearly $3.8 billion in daily trading volume, surpassing Ethereum's $1.7 billion and Base's $1.2 billion. Raydium has been a key driver of this growth and meme coins played a substantial role.
Insiders Print
At least 15 suspected insider wallets turned an initial $14,600 investment in the FOCAI meme coin into over $20 million. These wallets acquired over 60.5% of FOCAI’s total supply during its launch on Solana’s meme coin platform Pump.fun and sold their holdings for 94,175 SOL.
Meme Coins That Talk
The rise of AI agents in crypto, such as Aixbt and platforms like Virtuals Protocol and ai16z, has created both hype and skepticism. While these AI-powered bots and their associated tokens have gained traction, critics argue that most are "chatbots with meme coins attached," offering little real utility.
Popular AI agents act as social media influencers, providing investment tips and analysis. However, their limited functionality and reliance on human intervention have drawn criticism.
What Can You Do Next?
- Keep an eye on MemeFi because it’s here to stay.
- Meme coins show signs of slowing growth. Make sure to have a diversified portfolio.
- Be careful of scams promoted by influencers and celebrities.
- Remember that meme coins often decline faster when the larger market retraces.
- Consider reinvesting some profits into safer crypto tokens or stables.
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