PEPE Leads Meme Coin Rally as Ether Nears $4K

Traders have been using meme tokens as a proxy bet on the growth of Ethereum or other blockchains.

Meme coins like PEPE, SHIB, and DOGE have surged as much as 26% in the past 24 hours due to a “spillover effect” from the growth of Bitcoin and Ethereum

Traders have been using meme coins as a proxy bet on Ethereum’s growth since late February, and the bullish demand for ETH has been increasing since mid-January due to expectations of a spot ETF approval in the U.S.

Pepecoin (PEPE), shiba inu (SHIB) and dogecoin (DOGE) jumped as much as 26% in the past 24 hours as ether (ETH) inched towards $4,000, a level it previously saw in December 2021.
PEPE jumped 26% on renewed optimism, while DOGE and SHIB reversed Thursday’s losses to rise 10%. The meme coin category tracked on CoinGecko showed an 8.6% sector growth on average, as CoinDesk 20, a broad-based index of various tokens, rose 2.53%.

As reported, traders have used meme coins as a proxy bet on Ethereum’s growth since late February.

“As bitcoin and ether rise, a spillover effect is caused where coins deployed on ethereum and solana also surge - including meme coins,” shared Slater Heil, co-founder and COO of DeFi platform Blueberry Protocol, in a message to CoinDesk.

“Investors will take advantage of bullish conditions as much as possible, and meme coins are one way for them to do so. In the short-mid term, I expect a transition back to ‘fundamentally driven’ altcoins,” Heil cautioned.

Bullish demand for ether started to increase in mid-January amid expectations that it would be the next major token after bitcoin (BTC) to get a spot exchange-traded fund (ETF) in the U.S.