Bitcoin Meme Coins: A Guide to the Meme Token Craze on Bitcoin

Meme coins arrived on Bitcoin last year with the launch of fungible on-chain tokens on Bitcoin. Today, there’s a growing ecosystem of Bitcoin meme tokens for risk-loving traders who want to cash in on the meme coin craze. 

Read on to learn about the Bitcoin meme coin ecosystem and how you can get involved.

Meme coins are community-driven crypto assets inspired by memes, art, individuals, animals, or any other objects that can be imitated for amusement. 

They generally don’t have any underlying utility or intrinsic value, and their popularity and price are purely speculative. That means a meme coin could become popular overnight and crash suddenly when the community's attention shifts to the next trendy asset.

Dogecoin (DOGE), currently one of the top ten crypto assets by market capitalization, is the pioneer of meme coins. It was rolled out on the Dogecoin blockchain in 2013 to “take the seriousness out” of cryptocurrencies. 

The digital currency drew inspiration from the famous internet meme featuring a female Japanese Shiba Inu dog named Kabosu, who recently passed at the age of 18. People find the meme amusing because variations of it include grammatically incorrect captions. Also, the meme’s title is misspelled to read as “doge” (pronounced “dohj”) instead of “dog.” However, contrary to the vast majority of meme coins, dogecoin can also be used for payments.

Since the launch of Dogecoin, projects have created many other meme tokens, such as Shiba Inu (SHIB) and Pepe (PEPE), mainly on the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain. 

Nevertheless, thanks to the Ordinals protocol and the BRC-20 token standard, meme coins became more prevalent on Bitcoin in 2023. Additionally, the Runes protocol inspired another wave of Bitcoin meme coins in 2024.

Bitcoin meme coins are community-driven crypto assets created using the BRC-20, Runes, or other Bitcoin-native protocol. 

These tokens are typically not designed to have any ordinary utility the way many other altcoins are trying to offer. However, a few Bitcoin meme coins have reached multi-million-dollar market capitalizations due to investor speculation. 

For example, at one point in June 2024, the runes token DOG.GO.TO.THE.MOON (DOG), surpassed $900 million market capitalization and is among the top ten meme coins by this metric. The token was airdropped to Runestone NFT holders in April 2024 and has attracted a large community of enthusiasts captivated by Dog, the adorable mascot dressed in a Bitcoin hoodie.

DOG is considered an attractive token by many meme coin lovers because it is community-led and adopts a token distribution mechanism with no pre-sale or team allocations. It aims to go “to the moon,” price-wise, and bring as many people as possible to the Bitcoin ecosystem. 

DOG was created by the Runestone Ordinals project led by Leonidas, an Ordinals advocate and builder. Leonidas first airdropped inscriptions (Runestones) to early Ordinals adopters and then distributed DOG tokens to Runestone holders.  

Another Bitcoin meme coin, PUPS, is on the top 30 meme coin list at the time of writing with a market capitalization of around $150 million. This token was created using the Ordinals-powered BRC-20 token standard and features a funny-looking monkey.

The Bitcoin meme token craze started with the launch of BRC-20, an experimental token standard powered by the Ordinals protocol. 

Developer Domo launched the standard in March 2023, bringing native fungible tokens to the Bitcoin blockchain. He also inscribed the first BRC-20 token, ORDI, which has a market capitalization of over $1 billion as of this writing. 

Shortly after the launch of ORDI, other meme tokens like PIZA, WZRD, MAXI, and MEME began to emerge and attract a lot of enthusiasts and speculators. Some BRC-20 tokens were also inspired by existing meme coins on Ethereum, such as Shiba Inu and Pepe. 

By late April to early May 2023, the number of BRC-20 transactions surpassed regular BTC transactions, indicating an increased interest in the meme coins. In May 2023, the total BRC-20 token market capitalization hit the $1 billion mark for the first time, and in June 2024 it reached $2.6 billion.

While the BRC-20 token market was thriving due to speculation, it was congesting the Bitcoin network with “junk” UTXOs (unspent transaction outputs), the BTC remaining after a transaction. 

As a result, in September 2023, Ordinals creator Casey Rodarmor proposed a BRC-20 alternative known as Runes. This new protocol promised to offer better UTXO management and reduce the on-chain footprint, clearing the Bitcoin blockchain from “junk” transactions. 

Riding on the potential of Runes, several projects such as RSIC and Runestone emerged months before the protocol’s scheduled launch. These projects offered free Ordinal inscriptions, which would then earn holders runes tokens after the protocol was rolled out. This generated a lot of interest from the Bitcoin community, making it clear that the meme coin mania wasn’t over. 

Fast-forward to today (post-Runes launch), and the RSIC and Runestone projects have some of the top runes in the market. RSIC’s RSIC.GENESIS.RUNE is among the top ten runes meme coins, while Runestone’s DOG is leading. Other Runes-based meme coins like PUPS.WORLD.PEACE (created by the Pups Ordinals project), SATOSHI.NAKAMOTO, LOBO.THE.WOLF.PUP and ANARCHO.CATBUS have also attracted relatively large communities.

Even as speculators jump on the newly released runes meme tokens, some BRC-20 tokens haven’t lost momentum. For instance, at the time of writing, ORDI’s 24-hour trading volume and market capitalization are higher than DOG’s.

You can buy and sell Bitcoin meme tokens created on the Runes protocol using the Sovryn DEX built on Rootstock (RBTC) and Build on Bitcoin (BOB) protocols. This is an attractive way to trade runes because the fees are low, the transaction is fast, and the quantities aren’t limited to pre-specified lots as they are on Bitcoin mainchain.

Currently, the exchange only supports POWA.RANGERS.GO (POWA) tokens, but it will add more runes tokens soon. 

Here’s how you can buy and sell POWA on the Sovryn DEX:

• Get a MetaMask wallet if you don’t already have one.
• Set it up and load your wallet with ETH or RBTC. You’ll need ETH if you’re transacting on BOB and RBTC if you’re using Sovryn on Rootstock. We will use BOB for this example.
• Next, add the BOB network to MetaMask by clicking the “Add BOB” button at the bottom left corner of the screen. 
• Bridge ETH from the Ethereum mainnet to BOB.
• After the bridge transaction is complete, switch the active wallet network to BOB and then add POWA to your token list by going to “Import tokens.” You can find POWA’s contract address on BOB here.

• Open the Sovryn website and click “Go to dapp.”

• Select BOB and connect your MetaMask wallet to the exchange by clicking the “Get Started” button.

• Once connected, go to the “Convert” tab at the top.
• Choose ETH and POWA in the respective fields.

• Enter the amount of ETH you wish to spend to buy POWA.
• Click “Confirm” to complete the transaction. POWA will appear in your MetaMask shortly afterward.

Now, let’s say you wish to sell the POWA tokens you have purchased for tether (USDT). Here’s how to go about it:

• Open your MetaMask wallet.
• Ensure that you’re on the BOB network.
• Go to the BOB explorer and copy the contract address for USDT on BOB.
• Go to “Import tokens” on MetaMask and paste the contract address.

• Once you have imported USDT on BOB, go to the Sovryn DEX.
• Connect your MetaMask wallet and go to the “Convert” option.
• Choose  POWA as the “Convert from” asset and USDT as the “To” asset.

• Enter the amounts and hit “Confirm.”
• After the transaction is confirmed, you will receive USDT as indicated in MetaMask.

And that’s it! That’s how you can trade Runes on BoB, powered by the Sovryn DEX. 

Connect your wallet to the Sovyrn DEX to start buying and selling Bitcoin Runes meme coins.