Is the Memecoin Frenzy Evolving? — Analyzing On-Chain and Exchange Sentiment Shifts in the Web3 Memecoin Market
Murad outlines the Memecoin Supercycle, presenting his arguments in a way familiar to venture capitalists, including an outlook on altcoins, shifts in the crypto industry, and future trends:
- He defines the Memecoin Supercycle, dismissing altcoins that generate only $500 in daily revenue but are valued at $7 billion;
- He sketches out the golden age of Memecoins, at the cost of sealing the fate of altcoins that have fallen to the bottom, yet once carried bull market myths. “All altcoins are essentially Memecoins, just more complex versions.”
A Closer Look at $MOODENG
Moo Deng is a baby dwarf hippo, born on July 10, 2024, at the Khao Kheow Open Zoo in Thailand. Following the zoo’s posting of his birth photos on their official Facebook page, Moo Deng quickly became an online sensation. His rising popularity caused a significant spike in the zoo’s daily visitor numbers, doubling in early September 2024.
There are currently three Memecoins related to Moo Deng: $MOODENG on Solana and Ethereum, and $HIPPO on Sui. These coins were launched on September 10, September 15, and September 27, respectively
Let’s begin by analyzing the common on-chain data of Solana $MOODENG.
From the chart illustrating the growth of total wallet addresses, there are three noticeable periods of abnormal activity:
- The first surge occurred between September 16 and 18, with addresses skyrocketing from 1,970 to 22,645.
- After three days of organic growth, an unusual drop took place between September 21 and 22, where the number of addresses decreased from 25,790 to 9,204.
- The second spike in growth happened from September 29 to 30, with addresses rising from 28,344 to 49,502.
Additionally, out of the current total of 52,413 addresses, 25,464 have never sold any of their holdings since their initial purchase, resulting in a diamond hands ratio of 48%.
When we conduct a simple filter based on the holdings of on-chain addresses, we find that the number of $MOODENG held by the aforementioned anomalous addresses is less than 100 tokens each. In response to lower-than-expected natural growth in activity, the team quickly, massively, and linearly distributed nearly 20,000 addresses within three days. This triggered alarm indicators in chain-sweeping bots, while maintaining a stable upward price trend, drawing market attention.
Meanwhile, we observe the following three charts. These charts respectively show the total number of wallet addresses holding $MOODENG, the number of addresses holding 0.0005% of $MOODENG (4,950 addresses, valued around $693), the number of addresses holding 0.005% (49,500 addresses, valued around $6,930), and the number of addresses holding 0.05% (495,000 addresses, valued around $69,300). After filtering out bot addresses and raising the minimum holding threshold to 4,950 $MOODENG tokens, we can see a clearer trend: the number of small and medium-sized holders is steadily increasing, while the growth of large holders stopped after the 21st.
Focusing on small holdings, we can see a spike in the number of addresses starting on September 16, driven by an influx of new addresses. As the FOMO effect intensified, the natural growth of small holdings accelerated further, peaking on the 20th. Once the team observed this stable natural growth, they removed the bot addresses that were distributed between the 16th and 18th. As $MOODENG’s price peaked on the 28th, the number of addresses began to decline, in sync with the price trend.
The growth of medium-sized holdings slowed after the 18th, with larger sell-offs after the 28th compared to small holdings.
From September 28 to October 6, small holdings decreased by 12.2%, medium-sized holdings by 16.5%, and large holdings by 25.8%.
The peak times of the three categories of holders differ: large holdings peaked on September 21, medium holdings on September 27, and small holdings on September 28.
High Concentration of Tokens
Further analysis of $MOODENG on-chain data shows that excluding the top 10 addresses, the remaining top 5% of addresses hold nearly 90% of the circulating supply. Specifically, these top 5% addresses held 46% on the 10th, jumped to 71% on the 11th, and remained above 90% between the 21st and 24th. The current concentration stands at around 85%, indicating a high concentration of $MOODENG tokens.
Team’s Masterful Market Control
The team had been continuously buying since the token launch, up until the 28th. As shown in the chart, the team accumulated a large amount of tokens during the first two days, particularly on the 10th and 11th, which had a significant impact on maintaining the K-line trend. By looking at the two charts below, we can clearly see that the team made two strong price pushes on the 21st and 24th, breaking through the consolidation range rhythmically, using a three-day time frame as a box structure.
Comparison with Ethereum’s $MOODENG
Using the metrics mentioned above to observe on-chain data for Ethereum’s $MOODENG, we can see that retail investors had already lost interest in it before Vitalik sold $MOODENG from his wallet. On-chain addresses showed almost no growth, and the team did not actively maintain the community or price action — a common occurrence in copycat tokens. In the 10 days prior, the total number of addresses remained completely stagnant, signaling that the team had essentially given up.
Interestingly, during this period of price decline, addresses with medium-sized holdings began selling their tokens to minimize losses. From the 25th to the 5th, medium-sized holders continued selling. In contrast, retail investors followed a “buy and hold” strategy.
Controlling Token Holding Structure and Price Patterns: A New Approach to Memecoin Marketing
$MOODENG on SOL didn’t rely heavily on KOL promotion. Instead, the team focused on promoting their own X account. Their core strategy centered around controlling the token’s price pattern. While building a community, they accumulated a large number of tokens early on, concentrating the supply, and breaking through multiple consolidation phases. In terms of price trend control and trading strategy, the ETH team paled in comparison. The SOL team successfully controlled 90% of the tokens, whereas the ETH team only managed 48%.
However, controlling token supply is a common practice in any Memecoin. It’s not that controlling the supply isn’t important, but rather what comes after that control defines success. In terms of expanding influence, today’s Memecoins no longer rely on KOL promotion. For teams, the key is figuring out how to manually trigger bots and platform indicators. If done correctly, these bots and platforms can become free marketing tools.
A Glance at Murad’s Top 5 Recommended Memecoins by Market Cap
Murad’s criteria for selecting Memecoins are as follows: mid-cap tokens with a market cap between $5 million and $200 million; based on Solana and Ethereum; with at least six months of history. These criteria can also be understood using the indicators mentioned above. In my view, they translate into two key factors: the team’s willingness to maintain the price and the degree to which users experience FOMO (Fear of Missing Out).
The first factor refers to the team’s, whales’, or community’s ability to support the price during declines, maintain a long period of stable consolidation, and strongly push the price when a breakout is needed. For Memecoins, relying solely on user sentiment makes it difficult to sustain price growth, as no one can fully control the buying and selling behaviors of retail investors. Therefore, attracting large holders or retail traders ultimately depends on the team’s own actions on the token’s price, especially during downturns and breakouts. The concentration of tokens held by the team or whales to some extent indicates the willingness and determination of the team to act at key price levels. Of course, community support also plays a crucial role in this process. For example, the price movement of $SPX is not strongly correlated with the team’s actions, due to Murad’s influence.
The second factor can be analyzed by looking at the increase in the number of holders while monitoring the changes in the top holders, which can help guide the timing of a sell-off.
In terms of the dominance rate of the top 5%, all of Murad’s top five recommended tokens are heavily whale-dominated, with the team and large holders controlling most of the supply. Both $POPCAT and $GIGA have a concentration rate of over 85%, while the other three exceed 60%. This highly concentrated token structure ensures that when price trends shift or break out, the price can follow the team’s intentions to a certain extent and is less likely to collapse easily. For tokens with lower team holdings, you might see rapid price increases, but within 1–3 days, the price may start to collapse, making timing the sell-off much more critical.
Among these five tokens, the ones that best illustrate the two directions are $POPCAT, $MOG, and $SPX.
The most recent team intervention in $POPCAT’s price structure occurred on October 10. A week prior, on October 4, the team did not significantly push the price, yet it broke the ATH (all-time high). However, after three days of upward movement, both retail and large holders began to sell. Over three days, the selling volume remained constant, but the price dropped by about 5% daily. On the 10th, the team made substantial purchases to keep the price within the ascending channel. The same scenario applied to $MOG, where the team intervened three times recently, around late September and early October.
$MOG is currently in a long-term consolidation box lasting six months, with a short-term uptrend lasting over a month. As the price approaches the middle of the box, retail investors begin to sell, and this sentiment strengthens as it nears the upper edge of the box. The team stepped in three times to prevent the price from breaking below the ascending channel, signaling their strong desire to maintain the trend and suggesting a potential breakout. Both $POPCAT and $MOG show clear signs of manipulation by the team/whales, giving the market strong signals and helping to build collective upward momentum.
In contrast, $SPX stands out as one of the most FOMO-driven tokens in the market during September, with extremely high retail buy-in sentiment. Its price accelerated through multiple ascending channels without needing much intervention from the team to sustain the impressive gains. Murad’s extraordinary influence further heightened the FOMO levels among retail investors for $SPX.
Overview of CEX Memecoins
Among the top 200 tokens, aside from Murad’s recommended five, the liquidity of most remaining memecoins primarily resides on CEX. During this cycle, memecoins traded on exchanges have shown varying performances. Based on liquidity dominance and the duration of a sustained price pattern, we can assess whether a strong price breakout is likely. How does this price action compare to that of on-chain memecoins?
When we look at specific cases, $Neiro and $TURBO both exhibit very high liquidity dominance, with most of their liquidity concentrated on Binance. When Binance holds the majority of tokens, it no longer needs to consolidate or accumulate, and can directly drive market momentum.
BRETT, MEW, and DOG are three other tokens with high dominance rates, all of which recently underwent price pattern shifts or breakouts. BRETT broke out of a five-month descending channel, and MEW from a seven-month one. However, since their liquidity is not concentrated on major exchanges, their post-breakout performance has been less impressive compared to the memecoins listed earlier. DOG, after its breakout, managed to maintain an upward channel for a month.
Due to dispersed liquidity, some tokens have failed to sustain an upward trajectory after breaking out, which is somewhat disappointing. For example, PEPE broke out of a seven-month consolidation period but is now in a two-week sideways channel, underperforming compared to other hot memecoins.
Other memecoins that achieved price breakouts include Wif, Bome, DOGS, and DOGE. Wif has been in a two-week uptrend, while Bome, one of Binance’s leading memecoins, recently broke out. Similarly, both DOGE and Bome broke out of seven-month consolidation periods, and their upcoming price action is highly anticipated. DOGS, however, remains in a three-month descending channel.
Tokens like SHIB, BONK, and MEME, which have been consolidating for seven months without a breakout, pose a different challenge. The more false breakouts these tokens experience, the less likely they are to establish independent upward momentum, making them more dependent on the broader market. When buying into these tokens, it’s crucial to keep an eye on stop-loss prices. People, which has been consolidating for four months, also requires attention when its price breaks out.
Conclusion
The memecoin craze is far from over, but that doesn’t mean altcoins are worthless. The question of whether focusing on fundamentals will yield returns in this cycle remains open. This article has explored how I analyze on-chain data to verify common patterns in the development of trending memecoins, offering a glimpse into one possible direction for memecoins’ future trajectory.
(All images in this article are created by the author. Please contact the author for permission to use them.)
About BlockBooster:
BlockBooster is an Asian Web3 venture studio backed by OKX Ventures and other leading organizations, aiming to be the trusted teammate of promising builders. We bridge Web3 projects and the real world through strategic investment and deep incubation.
Website: blockbooster.io
Disclaimer:
This article/blog is provided for informational purposes only. It represents the views of the author(s) and it does not represent the views of BlockBooster. It is not intended to provide (i) investment advice or an investment recommendation; (ii) an offer or solicitation to buy, sell, or hold digital assets, or (iii) financial, accounting, legal, or tax advice. Digital asset holdings, including stablecoins and NFTs, involve a high degree of risk, can fluctuate greatly, and can even become worthless. You should carefully consider whether trading or holding digital assets is suitable for you in light of your financial condition. Please consult your legal/tax/investment professional for questions about your specific circumstances. Information (including market data and statistical information, if any) appearing in this post is for general information purposes only. While all reasonable care has been taken in preparing this data and graphs, no responsibility or liability is accepted for any errors of fact or omission expressed herein.
