Memecoins outperform wider crypto market as 'fast money remains focused'

The market cap of memecoins has increased by over 10% in the past 24 hours — outperforming the rest of the cryptocurrency market.

The top five memecoins by market capitalization in the CoinGecko memecoin market capitalization category account for around 77% of the total memecoin market capitalization of over $58 billion. Of the top five  memecoins , shiba inu has posted a notable rally in the past 24 hours. The token is trading over 7% during that time frame, and 12% in the past week, The Block's Price Page shows.

Major memecoins such as  dogecoin , pepe and floki increased by 6%, 28% and 24%, respectively, in the past week. In comparison, leading cryptocurrencies bitcoin and ether increased by around 8% and 0.3%, respectively, according to The Block's Prices Page .

Fast money moving into memecoins

According to Wintermute analysts, "fast money remains focused on memecoins."

"This is noted in $PEPE, $BONK, $FLOKI and $ SHIB +5.76% ," the analysts said.

However, popular crypto trader DonAlt suggested in an X post on Wednesday that while the rest of the crypto market may remain stable, DonAlt anticipates significant losses for memecoins — warning that investors with portfolios heavily invested in iterations of dog or cat-themed coins might experience substantial losses.

"I'm personally convinced it's over for memes, rest of the market might get out of this okay, but I'm expecting memes to giga rug GL if your portfolio is in the 10th iteration of a dog or a cat," DonAlt said.

Not all crypto market participants were in agreement with DonAlt, however — with debate raging on both sides.

Wider crypto market rallies after softer inflation print

The wider cryptocurrency market also rallied in the past 24 hours as the impact of Wednesday's Consumer Price Index data set digital assets on an upward price trajectory. "We saw the bitcoin price increase by about 2.5% immediately following news that April CPI came in lower at 3.4% with core CPI at 3.6% - both in line with expectations," Bitfinex analysts told The Block.

According to the Bitfinex analysts, investors consider the softer inflation reading to be a bullish regime shift, as it marks the first decrease in CPI inflation over the last three months and comes after the U.S. Federal Reserve announced its intention to taper its quantitative tightening.

"In the last two months, the CPI print has formed local tops and so this is seen as being a favorable print for risk assets, and has had the opposite effect," Bitfinex analyst added.

However, they stressed that inflation is still above 3% — and, on Tuesday, the Producer Price Index inflation data showed a third straight monthly increase. "Although a lower inflation number is a good news, investors will have to wait and see if the Fed sees this as positive enough news to cut rates," the Bitfinex analysts explained.