The collective value of meme-inspired cryptocurrencies went past $150 billion in December 2024, driven by a wave of political-themed tokens following the U.S. election.
This record-breaking peak, documented in CoinGecko’s newly released 2025 State of Meme Coins report, was followed by a steep 69% decline within a year, illustrating the extreme volatility and sentiment-driven nature of this asset class.
The 2025 Memecoin Rollercoaster
The meme coin sector experienced a historic climb and a dramatic fall in a short period, with CoinGecko’s report showing the market’s value ballooned to $150.6 billion last December, significantly surpassing the previous high of $88 billion set in 2021.
This growth was largely powered by the “PolitiFi” trend, with tokens like Official Trump (TRUMP) gaining traction around the U.S. presidential election. However, the launch of other political tokens, such as LIBRA linked with Argentine President Javier Milei, coincided with the start of a major downturn.
By November 2025, the total market capitalization had collapsed to $47.2 billion. This drop occurred despite a period of intense creation, where, at the height of the frenzy in January 2025, new token launchpads like Pump.fun and BONK.fun were facilitating over 73,000 new token launches every day.
The report noted that the United States consistently showed the highest level of public interest in meme coins throughout the year, with its share of global attention growing from 20% to nearly 30%. However, overall global attention dropped by more than 80% from January levels, mirroring the market pullback.
The landscape was also marked by significant risk. Apart from insider-heavy launches, the ease of creating tokens led to other widespread issues, including an increase in rug pulls, where developers abandon projects, and “bundling,” where insiders use multiple wallets to fake organic demand for coins.
From Internet Joke to Mainstream Phenomenon
The journey of meme coins began in 2013 with Dogecoin (DOGE), created as a light-hearted parody of the crypto market. For years, it dominated the space, but the 2021 bull run, fueled by celebrity endorsements, opened the door for a wave of successors like Shiba Inu (SHIB).
The current cycle, which took off in early 2024, has been far more diverse, spreading from its Solana epicenter to networks like Bitcoin, Base, and BNB Chain. Still, DOGE controls about 47% of the sector’s total market value, recovering ground after briefly dropping below 30% during the height of Solana-based meme trading earlier in the year.
Today, dog-themed tokens remain the largest category, but new narratives around politics and artificial intelligence have also captured significant market share. But beyond speculation, CoinGecko noted that some projects are building broader ecosystems. Tokens like BONK and FLOKI now support decentralized finance (DeFi) tools and gaming platforms, while DEGEN has evolved into the native currency for an entire social media layer-3 network.
Looking ahead, the report suggested that the integration of centralized exchanges (CEXs) with DeFi may shape the next chapter, with major platforms such as Coinbase and Binance now providing in-app access to on-chain token trading. This has blurred the boundaries and could potentially attract more users to the meme coin ecosystem, according to the study.
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