Memecoins dominated 31% of coverage of crypto assets in 2024, according to a report from Coingecko.
This is a nearly 4x increase compared to last year, when the theme attracted only 8.32% of investors in 25 reports.
The rise of memecoins was initially driven by dog-themed tokens, but expanded to new areas in 2024, including animal- and personality-themed tokens.
The trend highlights investors’ preference for speculative opportunities, where cultural virality takes precedence over traditional fundamentals, the report said.
Memecoin launch pool Pump.fun can serve as a proxy for the success of these tokens.
According to user evelyn223’s Dune Analytics dashboard, nearly 5 million new Memecoins have been deployed on Solana alone this year, with the platform earning more than $335 million in fees.
The Memecoin narrative took the top spot among Crypto asset narratives, accounting for 14.36% of investor share.
Four Memecoin trends also made the top 20: Solana Memecoin (7.65%), Base Memecoin (2.13%), AI Memecoin (1.49%), and Cat Theme Memecoin (1.19%).
Memecoins are the third most profitable Crypto asset in 2024, with an average annual return of 201%, according to Artemis. Its gains are also higher than the market’s average return of 128%.
This year, the development of artificial intelligence technology has raised investor expectations for the crossover between AI and blockchain.
As a result, this became a popular trend in the Crypto asset community, accounting for 15.67% mind share among the six narratives.
The core AI ecosystem was responsible for the majority of popular trends, ranking second in overall popularity with a 12.58% share, up 1.26% from last year.
AI-related trends, such as AI Agents (1.17%) and AI Memecoins (1.49%), further contributed to the growth of the technology's influence in Crypto assets.
This year, however, the popularity of the Memecoins space has risen sharply, eclipsing the performance of AI.
In addition, AI tokens have performed negatively this year by 11.6%, mainly due to Worldcoin's WLD falling 39%.
The Real World Asset (RWA) narrative gained traction, climbing to third place with 8.64% of investor interest, up 2.16% from 2023.
Similarly, Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePIN) also rose from 13th to 8th place, with a 1.56% increase in share.
By contrast, the share of blockchain games (GameFi) declined, from 10.49% in 2023 to 3.72% in 2024, reflecting waning interest in gaming-related blockchain applications.
The RWA sector posted an average annual return of 1,755%, largely due to a 6,520% rise in Mantra’s OM token.
As a result, the average return for tokens in this sector is exaggerated.
Meanwhile, the DePIN token jumped 30% in the same period, while the average performance of gaming tokens was negative 23.4%.
The blockchain ecosystem also attracted a lot of attention in 2024, with narratives related to Solana and Base gaining prominence, with Memecoins playing a key role.
Solana coverage accounted for 14.30% of the total, driven by Solana Memecoins (7.65%) and broader ecosystem interest (5.78%).
Base coverage accounted for 4.87%, driven by the Base ecosystem and Base Memecoins.
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