Former Coinbase CTO and crypto expert Balaji Srinivasan made headlines earlier in 2023 with a bold Bitcoin price prediction – that the flagship cryptocurrency would embark on another bull run and hit $1 million within 90 days.
Bullish Bitcoin Price Prediction Fails, Meme Coins Take the Spotlight
Srinivasan’s Bitcoin prediction was made in March, and with the deadline on his three-month Bitcoin target just around the corner, he has now conceded on the bet, according to Forbes. However, interest in crypto has still reached a fever pitch – it just hasn’t been directed at Bitcoin.
Instead it’s new meme coins that have taken centre stage, with a much lower market capitalization than BTC giving them room to explode by a much higher percentage in a shorter period of time. With a small meme token, a 5,000% gain is not uncommon, which is what Bitcoin would have needed to rise from around $20,000 to $1,000,000.
Copium Token ICO Leads to Huge Pump
This week Copium token exploded by several hundred percent following its initial coin offering (ICO) on Uniswap, reaching an $8 million valuation within the space of five minutes. $COPIUM joins a long list of meme coins hoping to be the next $PEPE, which rose over 100,000% in a single month in 2023 since its own ICO.
New Crypto ICOs vs Investing in Bitcoin
Investing in new cryptocurrency projects early in their roadmap, at the initial coin offering or initial DEX offering (IDO) stage – sometimes simply called the initial exchange offering (IEO) is a high risk, high reward strategy.
If a new crypto project delivers on the promises of its whitepaper, buying at such an early point often has much more potential upside in the short term than investing in Bitcoin. The Bitcoin price so far in 2023 for example, rose 87% from trough to peak – with a yearly open of $16,540 on Binance and reaching a high of $31,000 in April.
Early investors that take a gamble on a new crypto coin, from the presale or ICO stage, can outperform that rate of return in a matter of minutes, even in seconds. While the Bitcoin price is down 8% in May, new meme coins have still been exploding, as buyers seek out the latest new meme crypto project.
Bitcoin has a market cap of $520 billion, relative to new crypto projects which often launch with a market cap of well under $1 million.
The Copium Club Project
Following in the footsteps of assets like Pepe (PEPE), Sponge (SPONGE), Wojak (WOJAK) and Generational Wealth (GEN), that are based around recognizable internet memes – known by millions around the world even outside of cryptocurrency investors – Copium token adopts the simple MS Paint style ‘wojak’ meme often seen on social media including in crypto Twitter circles.
Associated with overcoming adversity or rationalizing a position – being told to ‘cope’ or ‘keep coping’ – the simple meme is universal and appeals to people regardless of their location in the world, political beliefs or native tongue. The wojak internet meme has become as well-known as the Pepe the frog meme, and is expected to continue to grown in the run-up to the 2024 US elections.
The copium.club website tagline is ‘how hard can you cope’, and the growing community in its Copium Club are part of a movement. The homepage describes the project with the introduction:
Bought the top, anon? Did your favorite influencer use you as exit liquidity? Were you part of a Ponzi scheme that left your bags worthless while others walked away with generational wealth? We feel your pain, and we’re here to help you cope.
$COPIUM now has over 2,100 holders and is listed on Uniswap, MEXC, LBank and Poloniex. Currently up approximately 400% from its listing price, Copium token initially rose almost 1,000%, reaching an $8 million market cap within five minutes.
Cryptocurrency ICOs Continue to Make Headlines
Interest in new meme crypto ICOs was spurred on by news Tron CEO Justin Sun would begin buying and trading promising meme cryptocurrencies publicly.
Meme token mania shows no signs of slowing down, noticed by New York Magazine who stated that assets like $PEPE and $SPONGE were even ‘causing big problems for Bitcoin’ – the high trading volume of meme coins was in part blamed for the recent network congestion issues that caused Binance to pause Binance withdrawals temporarily.
It remains to be seen if $COPIUM can achieve the same level of notoriety, but the new crypto project has a strong backing so far, including from cryptocurrency influencers Cozomo de’ Medici and FaZe Banks.
