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The crypto market faced a turbulent week, driven primarily by:

• U.S. Bitcoin strategic reserve creation (March 7).
• New Donald Trump’s tariffs (March 10-11)
• U.S. inflation data (March 12)

This article examines the key shifts in market behavior amid these events, focusing on trading volume distribution and capital rotation trends.

A Flee to the U.S. Dollar

On March 10 and 11, stablecoins’ share of trading volume experienced heightened fluctuations as a new wave of tariffs hit the market. The initial reaction was a flight to the U.S. dollar, with USD-related pairs temporarily doubling their share in trading volume, reaching 21% in a combined volume with USD-backed stablecoins.

USD-backed stablecoins even saw a slight supply decrease on March 10, suggesting that some market participants had exited the market. However, in the following days, stablecoins quickly regained their dominance, climbing back to a 92% share in combined trading volume, as capital rotated into USDT and USDC.

A temporary 34% decline in stablecoins’ share of total trading volume followed, but the sector swiftly recovered as altcoin holders increasingly shifted into stablecoins on March 11. The top five altcoins (ETH, XRP, BNB, SOL, and ADA) and the memecoin sector saw a rising share in trading volume alongside a decreasing share in market cap, indicating capital rotation away from these assets.

Bitcoin, on the other hand, briefly benefited from this turbulence. It saw a modest increase in both market cap and trading volume during key events — Monday’s tariff-driven uncertainty and Wednesday’s U.S. inflation data release. This highlights Bitcoin’s perceived role as a safe haven among altcoin holders during periods of economic uncertainty.

Potential Tariff Impact Weakening

Although the new tariffs wiped out nearly $300 billion in total market cap within a week, their impact on crypto trading volume was relatively subdued. The market saw a brief 2.5x surge in volume on Monday and Tuesday. For comparison, previous tariffs imposed on Canada, Mexico, and China in early February triggered a 4x volume spike, while EU-focused tariffs led to a 3x increase.

Despite this short-lived boost, overall crypto trading volume remained in a downtrend, recording a 7% weekly drop, with Bitcoin (-23%) and stablecoins (-19%) being the primary contributors. This decline underscores reduced liquidity and weaker capital flows.

A Runaway from Ether 

Among top altcoins, Ether saw the most significant capital outflows relative to its size. Its trading volume share jumped from 13% to 22% within a week, while its market cap dominance declined from 8.70% to 8.15%. This divergence suggests that traders were actively rotating out of ETH, primarily in favor of fiat, stablecoins, and Bitcoin.

Furthermore, Ethereum’s 2% market depth shrank by 14% over the week, reflecting a more fragile order book and an increasing risk of price volatility. 

However, as overall market activity declined, trading volume became more concentrated on Bitcoin and Ether. This suggests that while capital fled from many altcoins, traders continued engaging with ETH — albeit in a more volatile and less liquid environment — reinforcing its role as a core trading asset alongside Bitcoin.

TRUMP Dominance Reached New All-Time Low

Despite a week dominated by Trump-related events, the market has shown little interest in the TRUMP token. Once a major speculative asset, the token briefly commanded 10% of the entire crypto trading volume on Donald Trump’s inauguration day. However, its relevance has since faded, with its trading volume share recently plunging to a new all-time low of 0.51%. 

This sharp decline suggests waning speculative enthusiasm and diminishing liquidity, potentially limiting the token’s ability to stage a meaningful recovery unless a new catalyst reignites interest.

Key Figures and Discoveries

• The memecoin market cap declined by 58% since its January peak, while its weight within the broader market decreased to less than 2%, as of April 1.
• Memecoins’ share of total crypto trading volume dropped below 4%, as the sector’s total volume fell 63%.
• At its Q1 peak, memecoins briefly made up 11% of total crypto trading volume.
• The DEX volume on Solana and Base became more memecoin-focused in Q1, despite a decline in memecoin-specific volume.
• Political memecoins surged amid the TRUMP and MELANIA token launches but have since dropped 80% in market cap and 99% in volume.
• 21% of all digital assets ever created across all networks have been launched on Pump.fun, but the pace of new token launches significantly slowed down in Q1.
• Raydium turned even more reliant on memecoins after the political memecoin frenzy subsided, with the share of memecoin-related volume increasing from 77% to 83%.

Introduction

Over the past year, memecoins have managed to establish higher baselines in terms of market cap and trading volume after each wave of excitement. However, in early 2025, the sector deviated from this trend. Following the rapid boom-and-bust cycle revolving around political memecoins, the sector erased much of its post-election gains, bringing valuations back to pre-election levels and raising questions about its resilience.

In this report, we examine whether this is just another cooldown before the next wave, or if memecoins are finally losing their grip on the market.

Global Trends

The Weight of Memecoins in the Crypto Market Cap

The memecoin market cap declined by 50% over the first three months of 2025. For comparison, Bitcoin’s market cap fell by 10%, while Ethereum’s dropped by 44% over the same period.

As a result, the weight of memecoins across all major crypto market cap metrics has seen a substantial decline so far in 2025. By April 1:

• The total crypto market cap share fell to 1.8%, marking a 39% decrease.
• Total2 (excluding BTC) share dropped to 4.8%, a 31% decline.
• Total3 (excluding BTC and ETH) share shrank to 6.2%, reflecting a 37% drop.

Memecoins hit a local quarterly peak in market cap on January 18, shortly after the launch of the TRUMP token. Since then, the sector has lost 58% of its value, bringing its market cap back to pre-election levels.

This decline suggests a cooling off of the memecoin sector, with capital rotating toward other crypto segments, particularly Bitcoin and stablecoins, as market uncertainty increased. Additionally, the pump-and-dump cycle associated with the LIBRA token launch further dampened sentiment within the sector.

The Weight of Memecoins in Crypto Trading Volume

Memecoins entered 2025 with relatively subdued trading activity, as post-election user engagement continued its gradual decline. Despite this, the sector saw an even sharper drop in Q1, with trading volume falling 63%. Meanwhile, trading volume for major digital assets like Bitcoin and Ethereum surged in early 2025, further reducing memecoins’ share of overall crypto trading volume. By April 1, memecoins’ share of total trading volume had dropped below 4%, marking a 58% decline.

However, if measured from its quarterly peak rather than January 1, the decline appears even more dramatic. The sector’s trading volume peaked on January 20, during Donald Trump’s inauguration, when memecoins briefly accounted for 11% of all crypto trading volume. Since then, memecoin trading volume has plummeted by over 93%, while its weight in the overall market volume shrunk by nearly 5 times.

This massive drop in activity underscores that the latest political memecoin frenzy has fully evaporated, leaving the sector in a hibernation phase, awaiting a new catalyst to reignite interest.

Local Trends

Memecoin Performance by Network

Solana received the most attention in early 2025, hosting TRUMP, MELANIA, LIBRA, and several other hot memecoins. Its strong user engagement positioned Solana as a key driver shaping the overall performance of the memecoin sector.

As such, memecoins experienced a sharp downturn in Q1 2025, with both market cap and trading volume declining across all major networks. Dogecoin showed relative resilience compared to the rest, suggesting that traders still see it as the Bitcoin equivalent inside the memecoin sector. 

Meanwhile, smaller ecosystems like TON, Tron, and Sui were hit hardest, suffering the steepest losses in both market cap and volume. This indicates that speculative interest in memecoins has continued consolidating around larger chains.

During the political memecoin frenzy in late January, market cap and volume were largely redistributed in favor of Solana-based memecoins. For instance, on Trump’s inauguration day, Solana-based memecoins briefly accounted for 70% of the sector’s trading volume. However, as the frenzy subsided, the market structure essentially “reset,” returning to early January levels.

Memecoins Tighten Their Grip on Solana and Base

Despite a decline in total and memecoin-specific volume, Base became more memecoin-dependent in Q1 2025. Memecoin dominance rebounded to 27% in March after hitting a low of 20% in February. This rapid resurgence of memecoin dominance on Base could indicate early signs of a local memecoin frenzy cycle, as traders shift attention back to high-risk, high-reward assets. 

In turn, Solana saw a decline in memecoins’ share of its monthly DEX volume, dropping from 54% in December to 47% in March. However, this doesn’t mean Solana is becoming less memecoin-dependent — rather, the opposite.

In late February and early March, Solana DEXs experienced a surge in SOL volume, intensifying the asset’s selling pressure at that time. As a result, memecoins share in DEX volume briefly dipped, largely impacting monthly performance.

Starting in mid-March, memecoins have been rapidly reclaiming their positions on Solana, jumping back above 50% share despite stagnant overall volume last month. This mirrors the decline in memecoin volume and market share observed between August and September (red rectangle), which later gave way to a new memecoin hype cycle.

The swift rebound in memecoins’ share suggests that traders are once again gravitating toward speculative assets, indicating that Solana’s reliance on memecoins could strengthen in April. If this trend continues, it may trigger another wave of local memecoin frenzy, further solidifying their role as a key driver of activity on the network.

Source: Blockworks Research

Memecoin Performance by Category

The latest memecoin frenzy also caused major shifts across different thematic categories.

Dog- and cat-themed memecoins, historically dominant in the sector, experienced significant declines, reflecting a broader retreat from legacy meme narratives. The trading volume dropped more than market cap for dog- and AI memes, suggesting that liquidity is drying up faster than valuations, potentially signaling weaker demand and lower trading activity.

Political memecoins were the standout exception, experiencing a 267% and 86% increases in market cap and trading volume, respectively. The jump was driven by high-profile launches like TRUMP and MELANIA, and could have been even more substantial, but the hype rapidly evaporated — market cap and trading volume dropped by 80% by 99%, respectively, from their January peaks.

Political memecoins now account for 5% of the sector’s market cap and 8% of its volume. Although the sector became more reliant on this category, memecoins are well-positioned to decouple from political narratives in the next potential speculative cycle.

The Most Powerful Memecoin Duo (For Now)

Over the past year, Pump.fun + Raydium has been the most dominant force not only in Solana, but the entire memecoin sector. Pump.fun, the most popular Solana-based launchpad, is responsible for over 50% of all SPL tokens created daily, primarily memecoins. Once these tokens graduated by reaching a $69,000 market cap, they were automatically deployed on the Raydium DEX. In turn, Raydium has primarily processed more than 80% of all memecoin trading volume on Solana throughout the last 12 months.

However, in Q1 2025 both platforms decided to reduce their unofficial interdependence. On March 20, Pump.fun announced the launch of its AMM DEX, PumpSwap, while Raydium is working on launching its own dedicated launchpad. 

Although the long-standing synergy between Pump.fun and Raydium will likely weaken over time, this duo remains a critical driver of the memecoin ecosystem to this point. To better gauge market sentiment, let’s examine the performance of both platforms.

Pump.fun Performance

Starting 2024, Pump.fun users have been highly active in launching new tokens, contributing to the platform’s staggering 21% share of all digital assets ever created across all networks. However, while in Q4 more than half of all newly created tokens were launched on Pump.fun, this figure declined to 35% in March.

Despite the slowing pace of new token launches, only 1% of newly created Pump.fun tokens reach the graduation threshold, and this rate has consistently declined throughout Q1 2025. A drop in both the number of newly created tokens and their graduation rate signals reduced momentum in the memecoin sector, with fewer projects gaining enough traction to sustain growth.

This shift aligns with a broader decline in platform activity throughout Q1 2025. Key metrics, including active addresses, trading volume, and revenue, have all seen substantial declines in Q1 2025. However, over the past few weeks, Pump.fun activity has increased by more than 50%, helping to offset some of the Q1 losses.

One of the major catalysts behind the boost was the PumpSwap launch in late March, which saw $2 billion in cumulative volume and generated over $900,000 in revenue since launch. The new platform rapidly became the main trading hub for Pump.fun tokens, reducing Raydium’s volume share for dedicated tokens from 69% to 21% in a few days.

However, the platform’s impact on the wider memecoin sector has been more modest. Although Solana’s memecoin DEX volume jumped by 61% shortly after PumpSwap’s launch, this momentum almost entirely vanished in the following days.

Raydium Performance

Memecoins play a key role in Raydium’s performance, and the platform has become even more reliant on them, even after the political memecoin frenzy subsided. In Q1 2025, memecoin-related activity, while declining, proved slightly more resilient than Raydium’s overall performance. As a result, the share of memecoin trading volume increased from 77% to 83% over the past three months.

Meanwhile, notable divergence emerged — while trading volume plummeted by over 80%, the number of trades dropped by only 30%. This suggests that memecoin traders are still active but have become more cautious, opting for smaller, lower-risk trades.

Final Thoughts

As such, Q1 2025 performance suggests a cooling phase for the memecoin sector, characterized by reduced speculative enthusiasm, lower liquidity, and smaller trade sizes. While this downtrend reflects a shift in trader behavior, it does not necessarily signal the end of the memecoin cycle. Market revivals in this sector often stem from external catalysts, such as major narrative shifts. If fresh narratives emerge or broader market conditions improve, the memecoin sector could quickly regain momentum, making this period of contraction a potential setup for the next wave of growth.

However, while memecoins may see another short hype period within this cycle, it may not be as substantial until the meta approach undergoes significant changes. The sector remains full of pump and dump schemes that rightfully keep traders cautious. The controversial “Libragate” event served as another wake-up call, highlighting a need for the sector to revamp itself.

Although the SEC recently clarified that memecoins are not considered securities, regulators have begun scrutinizing the sector more closely. The memecoin environment could mirror the post-ICO boom of 2017, when an initial wave of excitement gave way to regulatory intervention and a shift in market dynamics.

Sources

The data used for this research consists of publicly available information from CoinMarketCap, CoinGecko, Blockworks Research, Dune, and Artemis. The observation period for this study was focused on Q1 2025, with data points primarily ending April 1.