Meme Tokens

Memes got involved in our lives so deeply and strongly that they have become a new type of humor, memes are literally everywhere! But could we ever imagine that they would rule the crypto industry in 2021? Definitely not. Hands down - 2021 was the year of meme tokens.

What Are Meme Tokens?

Basically, meme tokens are cryptocurrencies. They are based on blockchain technology, they can be traded, exchanged, kept in a crypto wallet, used as a means of payment, etc.The thing which makes them remarkable is that the creation of a meme token is inspired by popular social media jokes, events, and puns.

In fact, the first-ever meme token Dogecoin was created as a joke and parody in 2013. As of this day, there are already more than 100 meme tokens listed on CoinMarketCap.

The main difference with the classical cryptocurrencies is that meme tokens very often neither have any measurable value and long-term purpose nor do they contribute to the development of blockchain technology.

People buy and support these tokens being followed by emotions in order to try their fortune of making a quick buck. Just as often, they want to join the community or contribute to something they think is fun and entertaining.

There are some simple key features of meme tokens:

1. Meme tokens are situational and quite unstable. They disappear as fast and unexpectedly as they arise. Even by the time meme tokens get recognition in the community, they rarely provide a roadmap with long-term plans. 
2. Even more volatile than cryptocurrencies usually are.
3. Extremely community-driven. One tweet or Instagram post from an influencer can literally ruin or revive meme tokens.

Big Time Meme

As we already mentioned, there was a boom of meme tokens this year. They didn’t just grow in number and variety, they also became more accepted in society. Let’s take a look at some of them.

Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, Kishu Inu, Floki Inu …

There are a lot of meme tokens based on the memes with dogs that were trending this year. The most popular one of them is probably SHIB, a token based on a Japanese dog called Shiba Inu. In 2021, just in a year since its creation, Shiba Inu made it to the top 10 most prominent cryptocurrencies by the CoinMarketCap rank. You can read more about dog-tokens in our article.

MonaCoin (MONA)

Another animalistic token of Japanese origin is MONA - a token based on a meme of a cat-like figure. It first appeared on WBS TV Network Tokyo, where a man was said to be buying a piece of land in Nagano with MonaCoin. Even though MonaCoin is a meme token, it is approved by Japan’s Financial Service Agency.

Squid Game

In September 2021 Netflix launched the Squid Game TV show, which became Netflix's most-watched series to date and gathered a lot of attention. Of course, such a hyping thing couldn't get away from scammers' sticky hands.

In October anonymous users (without Netflix’s permission) launched a meme token Squid Game (SQUID). In several days its value skyrocketed from around $2 to $2,861 per token! And after that, even faster, faced a downfall to $0.2.

The problem was that users couldn’t withdraw their assets from the exchange. Even though there was word spreading across social media that the assets can’t be withdrawn, it didn’t stop investors. Only when the total market cap exceeded $30 million and the anonymous developers have just simply disappeared from social media, it became clear that the project was a total scam from the very beginning. The estimated profit gained by the scammers is $3.38 million. This kind of theft is called a “rug pull”, meaning that when enough money is gained the developers quickly cash out the profit and drain the liquidity pool from the exchange.

MANDO

Not listed on Coinmarketcap, not generally recognized, anyway hyped meme token is Mando. The public noticed it when a popular teenage TikToker, Matt Lorion, promoted the token across his social media. He claimed it to be a meme token based on the Disney TV show Mandolorian. However, when later the meme crypto turned out to be a scam, the influencer said he had no idea about that. The scam was based on a pump-and-dump scheme, where the stock's prices are based on exaggerated statements. Anyway, at that time the investments in the scam projects were already made, so the blogger had to publicly apologize later. Matt Lorian is known for posting crypto and trading education content, thus he had a reputation to take care of.

Where Is It Going?

Why do people keep on investing in various meme tokens? Seems that the answer is quite simple - people just want to have fun and are prone to trust a “trademark”. When they see that their favorite media characters or cute animals are being the face of the project, they find these projects more reliable than any other high-tech crypto platforms that are unknown or too complicated for them.

Furthermore, some crypto enthusiasts believe that cryptocurrencies are high-risk investments, but if a person decides to join, they should be ready for unexpected ventures.Very often meme tokens come at a low unit cost, for little money one gets plenty of tokens. People look at their crypto wallets and dream about the token price going up to a dollar because they’ve already seen meme tokens acting so. But here is the thing, you never know for sure.

Some people think that meme tokens are just tools to manipulate big sums of money. When a quick profit is made, investors lose interest and quit the crypto-project. Once some new kind of investments emerges (and with the upcoming 2022 trend of Metaverse it’s much likely to happen) investors will move forward, completely abandoning meme tokens.

However, there are also some optimists who believe it’s likely that more memes and fan tokens will appear on the market. Taking into account the constantly growing popularity of TV series, the developers may find some way to connect TV series with the blockchain, cryptocurrency, and tokens.

In any case, the meme token trend has already left its mark on crypto history, and we can only guess what will happen to the meme tokens next.

SimpleSwap reminds you that this article is provided for informational purposes only and does not provide investment advice. All purchases and cryptocurrency investments are your own responsibility.