The 2024 Crypto Market: Meme Coins Capture Attention, AI and Emerging Sectors Face Challenges

The cryptocurrency ecosystem in 2024 presents an interesting picture. Data shows that investor attention across the entire industry is fragmented, with the most notable phenomenon being meme coins capturing nearly one-third of the attention share. This phenomenon marks a profound shift in market sentiment.

Absolute dominance of Meme Coins

According to market data analysis, meme coins and their related derivative narratives collectively attract over 30% of global investor attention. This figure is distributed across mainstream meme coin concepts and 25 different related trends. The underlying implication is very clear: the market is experiencing a speculative frenzy, with fundamental analysis gradually being marginalized, and investor interest expanding from traditional dog-themed tokens to various animal-themed and celebrity-related tokens.

The core narrative of meme coins accounts for 14.36% of the total crypto narrative attention, an increase of 6.04 percentage points compared to 8.32% in 2023. In other specific subfields, Solana ecosystem meme coins rank fourth with 7.65% attention, while Base, an Ethereum layer-2 network asset, ranks eleventh with 2.13% attention. AI-themed meme coins and cat-themed meme coins received 1.49% and 1.19% attention respectively, entering the top twenty narratives.

AI growth slows, new tracks quietly emerge

Artificial Intelligence (AI) narratives remain hot in 2024. Summing all AI-related main narratives and five AI sub-narratives, the total attention reaches 15.67%. The main AI narrative ranks second alone, controlling 12.58% of investor attention. Although this is an increase from 11.32% in 2023 (a growth of 1.26 percentage points), its popularity has been overtaken by meme coins.

More noteworthy is the performance of RWA (Real-World Assets) and DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure) tracks. RWA narratives’ attention jumps from 6.48% in 2023 to 8.64% in 2024, an increase of 2.16 percentage points, rising from sixth to third place. DePIN also shows strong momentum, with attention increasing by 1.56 percentage points, climbing from thirteenth to eighth place. The rise of these two tracks reflects the market’s renewed focus on practical applications and new infrastructure.

GameFi’s decline

In stark contrast, the GameFi narrative has declined sharply. Once a prominent track, its attention dropped significantly from 10.49% in 2023 to 3.72% in 2024, a decrease of 6.77 percentage points. This indicates that investor enthusiasm for gamified financial narratives has cooled markedly, and the market cycle is gradually phasing out outdated concepts.

Overall, the narrative competition in the crypto market in 2024 is characterized by “meme coin sweeping the field and the differentiation of new and old tracks,” providing savvy participants with a window to reassess their investment strategies.