Memecoins Are Down, Not Done: Why Their Next Iteration Will Look Very Different
Memecoins may have fallen out of fashion after a brutal market collapse, but industry leaders argue the concept is far from dead. According to MoonPay president Keith A. Grossman, what the market called “memecoins” was only a crude, early experiment. The real innovation, he says, is the discovery that human attention itself can be tokenized — and that idea is not going away.
Grossman insists that the current bear phase does not signal the end of memecoins, but rather a transition. In his view, the next wave will be more sophisticated, more regulated, and more aligned with real-world use cases. The chaotic, casino-like tokens of the last cycle served their purpose: they proved that anyone, anywhere, could cheaply mint and distribute tokens that capture and direct attention at scale.
At the core of this phenomenon is a simple, but powerful shift. For decades, the attention economy was controlled by centralized platforms that monetized user engagement without meaningfully sharing that value with participants. Memecoins showed that blockchain-based tokens could fracture that model. They made it possible to turn collective hype, culture, and visibility into on-chain assets that anyone can buy, sell, or speculate on — for better or worse.
Grossman argues that this is where the real promise lies. Blockchains drastically lowered the cost and friction of issuing tokens tied not to traditional cash flows, but to cultural relevance, memes, personalities, or online movements. For the first time, attention — likes, views, shares, and internet buzz — could be represented as liquid tokens, and markets could rapidly price that attention in real time.
The problem, he says, is that the first generation of memecoins captured attention but failed to convert it into lasting value for most participants. While traders chased quick gains and early insiders profited, the broader user base was often left holding rapidly depreciating assets. The value created by viral campaigns and speculative frenzy rarely flowed back in a sustainable way to those who generated the attention in the first place.
He compares today’s skepticism about memecoins to the early days of social media. When the first batch of social platforms crumbled in the early 2000s, many analysts confidently declared the model broken and the trend overhyped. What followed instead was a second generation of social networks that redefined how culture, politics, and business operate. Grossman believes memecoins are at a similar turning point: the clumsy first act is ending, but the underlying idea is only beginning to be explored.
This perspective is striking, given how extreme the last cycle was. In 2024, memecoins were among the best-performing segments of the crypto market and dominated investor narratives. Tokens based on jokes, animals, and internet humor frequently outperformed more established projects, drawing immense retail interest and spawning tens of thousands of copycats. Speculative excess, not fundamentals, powered the sector.
That frenzy did not last. Mounting criticism that memecoins and social tokens had no intrinsic value, combined with a series of spectacular collapses, shattered confidence. As prominent projects imploded, liquidity vanished, prices cratered, and many investors exited the sector altogether. What had been the most talked‑about trend in crypto quickly turned into a cautionary tale.
The breaking point arrived in the first quarter of 2025. The memecoin market suffered a full-blown collapse, driven by severe price drawdowns and a wave of so‑called “rug pulls” — situations where developers or insiders drained liquidity, abandoned projects, or otherwise left retail investors with near-worthless tokens. These events reinforced the image of memecoins as predatory schemes rather than innovative assets.
High-profile political figures added fuel to the fire. In the United States, President Donald Trump launched a memecoin ahead of the January 2025 inauguration. The token initially soared, hitting a peak of around 75 dollars, riding a wave of political fandom and speculative mania. But the rally proved unsustainable. The price collapsed by more than 90%, trading near 5.42 dollars at the time of reporting, leaving late participants with heavy losses and reigniting debates about the ethics of politicians launching speculative tokens.
A similar drama unfolded in Argentina. President Javier Milei publicly endorsed a social token called Libra in February. The asset initially gained traction and climbed to a market capitalization of roughly 107 million dollars. Yet, the project soon unraveled. The vast majority of LIBRA holders — around 86% — ended up with realized losses of 1,000 dollars or more, leading many observers to label the episode a rug pull.
The fallout went beyond lost capital. In Argentina, Milei’s attempt to distance himself from the token did little to calm public anger. Authorities opened an investigation into his involvement with Libra’s launch and promotion. The controversy escalated into lawsuits from retail investors and calls for impeachment from lawmakers, showcasing how tightly entangled crypto speculation and politics had become.
Episodes like these hardened public and institutional skepticism toward memecoins and social tokens. To critics, the sector appeared to be a revolving door of celebrity-backed pump‑and‑dump schemes. The narrative shifted from “fun, community-driven experiments” to “unregulated financial landmines.” Many concluded that memecoins were a failed idea, useful only as a warning about speculative excess.
Yet this is precisely the conclusion Grossman disputes. He contends that the execution was flawed, not the underlying concept. If attention can be tokenized, it can also be structured more responsibly. Future iterations, he suggests, could integrate clearer utility, stronger governance, and better alignment between those who generate attention and those who profit from it.
In a more mature phase, memecoins may shed the “meme” label altogether. Instead, we might see “attention tokens” or “social capital tokens” that reward creators, communities, and contributors more systematically. Rather than relying solely on hype, these tokens could tie value to measurable actions: content creation, community moderation, product feedback, event participation, or other forms of engagement.
Regulation is likely to play a central role in this transformation. The political token scandals have already highlighted the need for clearer rules around disclosures, conflicts of interest, and investor protection. Upcoming frameworks may require transparency on token allocations, vesting schedules, and governance rights, which would make it harder to stealthily orchestrate rug pulls or insider dumps.
Projects that survive into the next cycle will probably adopt structures closer to traditional startups or cooperatives, with well-defined roadmaps and accountability. Token holders may demand voting rights, revenue-sharing mechanisms, or programmable rules encoded in smart contracts to ensure that value distribution is not purely at the mercy of anonymous founders.
Another direction for an evolved memecoin sector lies in integrating tokens with real products and communities. Instead of existing as free‑floating speculative assets, attention-based tokens could unlock premium content, discounts, event access, or influence over product features. In this model, speculation still exists, but it is anchored by tangible benefits and clearer incentives.
Brands and creators are already experimenting with this logic. Imagine fan tokens that let supporters co‑create storylines, vote on merchandise designs, or shape the direction of a franchise. Or loyalty tokens that accumulate as users engage with a platform and can be redeemed for services, experiences, or status. These are all variations of the same concept: using tokens as a programmable layer over the attention economy.
Crucially, the technology that enabled the memecoin boom remains unchanged. Blockchains still offer transparent, borderless, and programmable infrastructure for issuing and transferring tokens. What will change is how societies choose to use that infrastructure. Early memecoins showed us that crowds can channel enormous capital toward symbols, jokes, and charismatic figures in a matter of hours. The next challenge is to harness that same energy in ways that are sustainable rather than extractive.
This is why many insiders believe it is a mistake to write off memecoins entirely. Just as the first failed social media platforms did not kill the idea of social networking, the collapse of today’s speculative tokens is unlikely to eliminate the broader concept of tokenized attention. Instead, it is more plausible that we are watching the end of a naive, experimental phase.
In the coming years, the term “memecoin” might become shorthand for the wild, unregulated early experiments in attention tokenization — a chapter remembered for both its creativity and its excesses. What replaces it may look less like a joke and more like infrastructure: standardized frameworks for turning influence, culture, and engagement into structured, tradeable digital assets.
For investors and users, this shift will require a different mindset. Chasing quick flips on viral tokens is unlikely to be a sustainable strategy. Evaluating future attention-based assets will mean asking harder questions: Who controls supply? What rights do tokens grant? How is value created, and who captures it? Are there real-world uses or long-term incentives beyond speculation?
If Grossman is right, memecoins are not a dead-end gimmick but an early, chaotic proof of concept. Their “resurrection” will not look like the animal-themed coins of 2024 or the politically charged tokens of 2025. Instead, it may arrive as a quieter, more professional class of digital assets that embed attention into the logic of online platforms, creator economies, and communities.
The first act ended in crashes, scandals, and disillusionment. The next will be defined by whether the industry can learn from those failures and build systems where tokenized attention serves participants rather than exploiting them. In that sense, memecoins are not gone — they are evolving into something far more serious than their name suggests.