Meme Coin did not "destroy" this cycle, but rather accelerated the industry's maturity.

Written by: Haotian

I see that someone in the English community said that Meme Coins have ruined this cycle. Although I have been advocating for “technical narrative + long-termism” most of the time, I still want to objectively sing a different tune: Meme Coins did not “ruin” this cycle, but rather acted as a market catalyst that accelerated the maturity of the industry.

1. The market has transitioned from “technology is king” to “attention is king,” with Meme Coins being the most intuitive embodiment of this shift. Projects with technical narratives that used to have three to five-year Roadmap Deliver cycles no longer have the market’s patience for waiting, believing, and entrusting. Therefore, Meme Coins are given a time window to attract liquidity through the short-term wealth Fomo effect.

2. Meme Coins are forcing a self-reform in technical narratives. The previous model of “technical packaging” in VC coins has reached a dead end. The era where one could harvest investors through financing valuations, technical packaging, and concept stacking has ended. Technical projects are compelled to return to real delivery, as investors have already tasted the sweet benefits of “simplicity and clarity, with a clear wealth effect” in Meme Coins, and can no longer accept projects that are “technically complex but have no long-term delivery.”

3. Meme Coins have expanded the boundaries and foundation of the entire market. No matter how sophisticated the technical narrative is, it can only attract a portion of the elite group that understands it. What Mass Adoption needs is an interaction method that is simple, easy to understand, and can quickly generate consensus.

When a large number of ordinary users enter due to Meme Coins, a portion of them will inevitably engage in deeper ecological exploration, which in turn brings an unprecedented incremental user pool to technical projects, solving the long-standing dilemma of “no one using” technical projects.

4. The Meme craze will not cover the entire cycle, but its overflowing market vitality will bless most of the crypto ecosystem. The nature of hot money chasing profits determines that Meme Coins cannot continuously generate wealth effects. When most people have experienced the duality of short-term wealth and zeroing out, they will naturally seek more balanced investment targets (tending towards more conservative investors).

At that time, technology projects that truly solve practical problems, establish user stickiness, and have a clear business model will welcome a valuation reconstruction, completing the transformation from concept to value. Therefore, for technological narratives, this is not the end, but the beginning of a rebirth through a nirvana.

5. Meme Coin is a complete reshuffle of the VC coin’s high FDV and low circulation model. The past VC-led financing model created a distorted market structure of “high valuation, low circulation,” which generally faced a decline after TGE, leaving almost no room for ordinary investors to benefit from holding coins, thus killing the dream of retail investors becoming wealthy in crypto.

On the contrary, although the risks are enormous, Meme Coins have revitalized the market with their transparency, simplicity, and equal participation for everyone, bringing the market back to a more fair and transparent competitive environment. It is hard to say that the shrinking market space of some VC institutions and their forced exit is unrelated to the increasing mainstream acceptance of MEME coins.