Are Bitcoin Runes back? Meme Coin Surge Increases Market Cap by Over $2 Billion

For the first time ever, the total market capitalization of tokens on the Bitcoin-based Runes protocol surpassed $2 billion, further upending the narrative that the new ecosystem for meme coins built on the Bitcoin network was dead on arrival.

According to the Bitcoin data analytics platform, the total value of written Rune tokens amounts to $2.06 billion. GeniiData. Just last week, that number surpassed $1 billion for the first time.

The surge in value appears to be largely due to one rune token in particular. DOG·GO·TO·THE·MOON (aka DOG). The dog rapidly increase Last week it was over 90% and it’s still less than a penny. Its current market capitalization is $797 million, making it the 9th most valuable meme coin across all blockchains. CoinGecko.

Runes’ recent surge in value appears to be a blessing of sorts for Runes creator Casey Rordamor, who has previously released NFT-like Runes. bitcoin ordinal Last year’s inscription protocol.

Before Runes launched alongside the Bitcoin halving on April 19, Rordamor jokingly tweeted that he would commit ritual suicide if Runes did not reach a market capitalization of $1 billion within a month of launch.

The Bitcoin developer appears to have managed to get his wish. According to GeniiData, Runes surpassed $1 billion in total market capitalization a day before Rordamor’s self-imposed deadline. Since then, the protocol has skyrocketed at an incredible rate, more than doubling its value in a matter of days.

There has been a particularly noticeable increase in rune activity over the past few days. The protocol’s daily trading volume approached $20 million on both Wednesday and Thursday for the first time since Loon’s launch week in April.

Spikes happen like many in the industry. amortization with runes failureConsidering the sky-high expectations associated with the protocol’s enticing pitch to simplify how meme coins (a hot asset category) can be created on top of the world’s ruling cryptocurrency.

Prior to Runes’ apparent comeback over the past two weeks, the protocol’s trading volume had plummeted by more than 90% following a short-lived blockbuster. debut.

Editor: Andrew Hayward