Pepe has led the meme coin market today, pumping 10% and adding over $50 million to its market cap.
The explosive move has prompted talks of an incoming meme coin season. This will also enable other meme coins to flourish and potentially outpace Pepe. With that in mind, our top picks for other meme coins to watch this week are Sponge, Frog Wif Hat, and rats (Ordinals).
Pepe Price Continues to Pump After Binance Simple Earn Launch
Pepe’s rally began on Friday when Binance launched a new Pepe promotion on its Simple Earn platform.
The promotion invites Binance users to complete a simple quiz for a share of 700,000 PEPE tokens. However, only the first 50,000 users to participate will receive rewards.
Following that, Binance offers users a 9% APY for simply holding Pepe tokens in its flexible savings protocol.
With Pepe’s demand usually limited to hype and speculative-driven, the passive rewards are warmly welcomed, incentivizing long-term holding and potentially bolstering the token’s demand.
The campaign launched on 23 February and was announced on Binance’s X account. The tweet garnered 270K views and 699 likes, illustrating a significant community interest.
Pepe price chart also reflects this interest, shooting up from $0.000001114 before the launch to highs of $0.0000015 today.
Meanwhile, its trading volume is also accelerating, up 27% today at $192 million. This makes it the 47th largest crypto by volume, while its market cap places it in the 117th spot.
Given its recent bullish momentum, renowned analyst Ali Martinez speculates a move toward $0.00000274 is incoming in the next few weeks.
Martinez notes an inverse head and shoulders pattern formation on the 3-day time frame. This pattern is a strong reversal indicator, typically followed by an explosive move to the upside.
“You know where PEPE is going! $0.00000166 first, then $0.00000274. Send it,” Martinez wrote.
Meanwhile, the CEO of BecauseBitcoin MaxbecauseBTC suggests Pepe will undergo a Shiba Inu or Dogecoin-like trajectory in the upcoming bull run.
“In my opinion, PEPE has the highest probability of being this cycle’s “Why didn’t I buy it” bag. The good news is that it hasn’t happened yet, so you can still do something about it.
February 29th is Leap Day,” explained Max.
However, Pepe’s bullish sentiment reflects a broader market excitement, with many analysts anticipating an all-out bull run in the coming months.
With that in mind, let’s consider three other meme coins that could also perform well.
Sponge
Sponge launched alongside Pepe in the depths of the 2023 bear market. It also exploded alongside Pepe, reaching a $100 million market cap and netting early investors a 100x ROI.
But equipped with experience and a successful track record, Sponge has reincarnated as Sponge V2, a Polygon-native token with a P2E game and new staking mechanics.
Sponge V2 was launched on 9 February, and it is looking to capitalize on the improving market conditions. Since launching, the token has already risen 41%. However, with a valuation just north of $51 million, significant room for growth remains.
Furthermore, its track record and Pepe ties make it a likely candidate to follow Pepe in the coming cycle, but potentially with more velocity.
Investors can buy Sponge V2 from the Sponge.vip website, where they can also stake it for an impressive 816% APY.
The original Sponge amassed over 13K holders and listings on over ten prominent exchanges. However, the website eyes “bigger and better exchanges” for V2, a potential nod toward tier-one platforms like Binance or Coinbase.
These factors have caught the attention of leading analysts, providing further conviction to potential investors. In a recent video, YouTuber Claybro waded, “Don’t miss the 100x potential” on Sponge V2.
Frog Wif Hat
An obvious contender for a Pepe alternative is Solana’s leading meme coin, Bonk.
However, its upside is limited because Pepe’s market cap is larger.
Furthermore, the meme coin community often roots for underdogs, leading to our next pick: Frog Wif Hat (FWIF).
Frog Wif Hat is a brand-new meme coin with a France-inspired design that aims to bring something fresh to the space.
Initially launched on Ethereum, Frog Wif Hat’s team plans to bridge the token to Solana in the second phase of its roadmap.
This revolutionary multi-chain approach is designed to extend Frog Wif Hat’s reach to the thriving Solana meme coin ecosystem, which has recently seen success through tokens like BONK, WIF, and HONK.
Additionally, Frog Wif Hat’s fair launch model and locked liquidity bolster its appeal.
These measures help instill trust – and showcase the development team’s commitment to transparency and fairness.
FWIF went live on Uniswap at 2pm UTC today, and its price is already up 270% in under three hours.
Retail investors are expected to continue piling in over the coming days as marketing efforts ramp up, and word spreads on social media.
With an ambitious roadmap that includes the goal of reaching a $100 million market cap, Frog Wif Hat is another meme coin that could be worth watching this week.
Rats (Ordinals)
A blockchain that rarely gets mentioned when discussing meme coins is Bitcoin. This is because the network is expensive to use, block space is scarce, and functionality is limited.
However, the advent of Bitcoin Ordinals enables projects to inscribe metadata (including text, images, and media) into Bitcoin blocks, broadening the network’s capabilities.
Rats, an inscription-based meme coin project, arose from this phenomenon.
Currently, it is up 1.69%% today, down 7.56% this week, but up 3.18% this month and 275% since launching on CoinMarketCap on 21 December 2023.
Rats holds a $247 million market cap and a $31 million 24-hour trading volume.
Similarly to other projects on our list, it has yet to gain Binance or Coinbase listings. However, other Bitcoin Ordinals projects have been listed, suggesting Rats may get picked up soon.
Rats is the largest meme coin within the Bitcoin ecosystem, which is incredibly bullish given its market cap equates to over $1 trillion. This will likely explode following the halving, presenting massive potential liquidity for Rats.
Community member Jack Yep recently highlighted that mainstream media outlets are noticing the Bitcoin ecosystem and speculated that Rats will benefit as the cycle advances, comparing it to a combination of Dogecoin and Shiba Inu.
