The memecoin market cap has increased by over 27% in the past 24 hours, significantly outperforming the rest of the cryptocurrency market, which posted an uptick of over 5% during the same period.
According to CoinGecko data , the market cap of memecoins currently stands at $34.7 billion.
In the past 24 hours, major memecoins such as Dogecoin, Bonk, and Shiba Inu increased 33%, 54%, and 27%, respectively. Meanwhile, the major cryptocurrencies increased by around 3% during that time, according to The Block's Prices Page . Bitcoin's dominance of the entire crypto market now stands at 50.6%, and ether's dominance is at 17.1%, according to Coingecko data.
Memecoin market rally
Nansen data journalist Martin Lee said that a growing risk-on sentiment is contributing to the recent memecoin market rally. "BTC is quickly approaching previous all-time highs," Lee told The Block. "As the market gets more risk on, capital will start to flow towards more speculative tokens and memecoins are at the top of that list."
NFTGators Markets Analyst Nicholas Kitonyi concurred with this viewpoint, and said that February's wider cryptocurrency market uptick is attracting more risk-on speculators.
"For retail traders who are willing to gamble on a small investment for potentially huge returns, meme coins provide just that. It is also easier to promote meme coins when the market mood is positive and potential investors are less skeptical," Kitonyi said.
DWF Labs plan Floki investment
Venture capitalists are increasing interested in memecoins, including Floki, a coin named for Elon Musk's Shiba Inu SHIB +17.57% dog. According to Unizen Head of Research Ajav Dhingra, some of the recent memecoin rally, "is being driven primarily by VCs like DWF Labs."
According to a Floki Medium post on Tuesday, DWF Labs has stated it plans to purchase $10 million in Floki tokens as part of their commitment towards supporting the Floki ecosystem. Speaking to The Block, Dhingra added that "this kind of VC investment is fueling speculation that other similar projects will also benefit from the hype."
In the past week, Floki has increased in value by over 70%, however, the memecoin has posted a more muted 2% increase in the past 24 hours.
