PEPE and BONK explode: Are memecoins back?

There are days when the crypto market looks less like a stock exchange and more like a playground. On Friday, memecoins reignited the traders’ cheeks: in 24 hours, the sector regained about 3 billion dollars in capitalization. So, meme season or just a spark? The answer rarely fits in a single number. It is rather hidden in a mix of attention, leverage, and timing.

A mood rally, but not a coincidence

Demand came back suddenly. Total memecoin capitalization rose about 8%, to 39.45 billion dollars, a two-week high. This type of rebound never happens quietly. It first attracts attention, then followers. And sometimes, it ends up calling for excesses. For some, it is a bubble mostly profitable for platforms, and much less for users.

In detail, on the crypto side, PEPE leads the dance with +23.6% over 24 hours, BONK follows with +10%, and DOGE advances about +8%. This trio is almost a barometer: when they move together, it’s not just one token pumping, it’s a market mood changing.

Then there is the cultural dimension in the crypto ecosystem. Vitalik Buterin changing his profile photo to an image linked to a meme NFT is trivial until it isn’t. Such a signal acts like a public wink: memecoins feed off attention, and attention quickly turns into flow. If attention opens the door, leverage pushes everyone inside. Sometimes a little too quickly.

The real crypto fuel: leverage and open interest

The market didn’t just buy memecoins. It also bet on them, with derivative contracts. For PEPE, open interest jumped about 77% in 24 hours, reaching 441 million dollars. When OI rises quickly, it often signals that leveraged positions are piling up.

Same mood on volumes. Memecoin derivative volumes reportedly rose about 35% in 24 hours, reaching 4.75 billion dollars, with a spectacular jump on PEPE. In other words: it’s not just a quiet spot rebound. It’s a market willing to pay more and risk more.

Where it gets spicy is the emergence of tools designed for this kind of frenzy. The buzz around MemeMax_Fi, presented as a memecoin-focused perp DEX with up to 100x leverage, precisely feeds this dynamic. A product designed to monetize attention at pure speed. The problem? At 100x, a price breath is enough to trigger a cascade of liquidations. And a cascade, in memecoin, rarely looks like a gentle landing.

To know if this is a real comeback or just an episode, you have to look beyond the frogs and dogs. Head to the entire altcoin market.

The decisive test: altcoins TOTAL3 traction

A technical element stands out. TOTAL3, the crypto capitalization excluding Bitcoin and Ether, reportedly gained about 22% in two days, to a zone close to 848 billion dollars. This is not a detail. A sustainable meme season needs fertile ground, and that ground is often the rotation to altcoins.

The mentioned RSI, risen after very low levels in mid-December, tells the same story: traders return to risk, but gradually, like switching on an old neon sign. If resistance around 848 billion breaks decisively, the idea of extending towards 900 billion becomes a credible scenario, and in that case, memecoins love playing the noisy passengers of the altcoin bus.

But there is a nuance the market often forgets when it laughs: memecoins don’t come back, they alternate. They disappear, then reappear when liquidity eases and sentiment clears. And when leverage gets involved, the question is no longer just if it goes up, but how long until it shakes.