In this round of the MEME cycle, countless people have gone crazy for memecoin. Yesterday (November 11), Binance listed the spot $PNUT and $ACT, which surged 330% and 1440% intraday, respectively. $ACT is the first AI MEME spot, and its big brother $GOAT didn't get the same treatment, only having contracts listed. $PNUT, as a squirrel-type MEME, looks no different from other "cat and dog" types of MEME coins, and its $500 million market cap is even slightly higher than the $ACT that was listed at the same time. In the eyes of most people, $ACT's cost performance seems to be higher than the ordinary little squirrel $PNUT. However, this is not the case.
Origin: The Beginning of the Story
The squirrel image of PNUT comes from the squirrel "Peanut" adopted by an engineer named Mark 7 years ago. Mark often shared videos of his interactions with Peanut on ins and gradually gained hundreds of thousands of followers.
However, nearby residents complained to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), claiming that Peanut carried infectious diseases. Surprisingly, the DEC raided Mark Longo's home without a search warrant and took away Peanut. Mark Longo then launched a petition on social media, which was signed by tens of thousands of fans. Unfortunately, Peanut was eventually euthanized by the DEC.
After Peanut's euthanasia, Dogecoin condemned the Democratic Party, and Musk also posted a tribute to Pnut and claimed that Trump's election would save Peanut.
This Peanut incident gradually evolved into a campaign against the Democratic Party. Meanwhile, a large number of Peanut derivative works appeared online, such as "the squirrel wearing a MAGA hat leading a rebellion". Since then, the animal image represented by Peanut has not only been a popular MEME of a web celebrity, but has also accumulated a "Trump" political color.
The Perfect Political Distance
As the saying goes, "distance creates beauty", and MEME coins are no exception. On the day of the US election, Trump took the lead and won the US election with 270 votes. However, many Trump-concept coins not only did not rise, but actually plummeted. Coins with concepts similar to "Trump" and "MAGA" are too close to Trump, without inherent narrative support, and the vested interest groups took the opportunity to cash out on election day, which is the so-called "good news is bad news". Coins directly named "Trump" and "MAGA" became the TOP Losers that day.
Not only in terms of narrative, PNUT has stronger sustainability, but in terms of listing, PNUT is also the best choice. Due to Binance's unparalleled listing effect, the market is looking for the next potential stock to be listed on Binance. Among the political series of concept coins, centralized exchanges cannot directly list tokens with strong political overtones like "Trump" and "MAGA", which undoubtedly increases the political risk of operations, and no one wants to take the risk of US judicial sanctions because of a token. PNUT, on the other hand, has the traffic of the political series and is subtle enough, with the "window paper" of the squirrel MEME background, which undoubtedly reduces a lot of uncertainty factors after listing.
And Peanut's political distance is just right, containing both the top-stream web celebrity MEME attributes of ordinary animal park MEME coins (like MOODENG), and the political concepts of Musk and Trump, with a broad mass base and political buff. PNUT has cleverly stood at the balance point of traffic and political narrative. Time and tide wait for no man.
Musk's Shopping List: A Spiritual Symbol Representing Democracy
PNUT's buff does not stop there, more importantly, PNUT stands in the flow center of Musk, the biggest driver of this round. Savvy readers may have already noticed that all targets related to Musk have far outperformed the overall crypto market performance, and even the token named MUSK has seen an upward trend. "MUSK Trade" has become the α of this cycle without saying more.
DOGE
As the largest MEME coin by market cap, DOGE is considered by most investors to be overvalued and less cost-effective than other "small-cap" MEME coins. However, over the past 14 days, DOGE has achieved a 120% increase, with a 7-day increase of as much as 96%. DOGE's excellent performance is partly due to Musk's support for Trump in the election, with the market generally believing that Trump's victory is a huge positive for Musk-related concepts. On the other hand, it is due to the potential positive impact of Musk applying Dogecoin to the payment system. It is also worth noting that on November 3, Robinhood Crypto has supported the transfer and deposit/withdrawal of DOGE tokens.
D.O.G.E
D.O.G.E is an MEME coin named after the Department of Government Efficiency that Musk is employed in, and it surged after Trump announced Musk's appointment. There are also countless other DOGE MEME coins with the same ticker that have also seen a general upward trend.
BAN
In 2019, Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan created the work "Comedian", with a banana taped to the wall as the main theme, which was sold at Sotheby's for $120,000, earning the title of "the most expensive fruit in history".
After experiencing a surge and then a plunge, on November 18, Musk retweeted a photo of a giant Banana prop alongside the SpaceX Starship, and due to the listing of the BAN contract on Binance, the market cap of BAN has already exceeded $300 million.
PNUT
PNUT still inherits the orthodox bloodline of the MUSK Trade. There is often a voice in the market that "the squirrel is just a tool used by the Republican Party to attack the Democratic Party, and it will be the end of PNUT after the election", but this is not the case. Not only does Musk himself often tweet in memory of the late squirrel Peanut, but other outside celebrities also mention the squirrel from time to time. For example, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch cited the "Peanut Squirrel" case as a typical example of government overreach, and UFC fighter Jim Miller won a match and stood up for justice for the little squirrel Peanut.
PNUT has long since transcended the level of "a tool to fight the Democratic Party", and has instead been upgraded to a kind of "spiritual totem supporting democracy and opposing dictatorship". More importantly, the squirrel Peanut has already sacrificed, and people can fabricate and endow more spiritual meaning to Peanut, and even constantly "deify" it.
Comparison with Other Memecoin
Zoo Series
We take the recently popular zoo series dog representative NEIRO and the hippopotamus series representative MOODENG as examples.
NEIRO is the new Shiba Inu officially announced by the Dogecoin owner, and after experiencing the uppercase and lowercase dispute and CTO, it has successfully risen from the ashes. MOODENG, the bouncing pig as the web celebrity hippopotamus of the Thai zoo, has an unparalleled traffic boost in Web2. In terms of community, PNUT does not have the strong consensus community support like Neiro; in terms of traffic, Moodeng far exceeds the fan-building ability of the squirrel in Web2. But even as powerful as Moodeng, it has not yet broken through $600 million, and Neiro is also hovering around an $800 million market cap.
PNUT not only has a similar level of propagation as other animal-themed icons with millions of followers, but also possesses unique political buffs and extremely strong explosiveness. PNUT surged by 500% just a day after its listing, rapidly reaching a market cap of $2 billion within a single day, a capability to quickly attract capital and market FOMO that other memecoins cannot match.
In summary, PNUT not only has the propagation capabilities of other animal-themed icons, but also has unique political buffs. Although PNUT is not a top IP, it is a bona fide hexagon warrior.
Political icon
In the political arena, PNUT's direct competitor is the "Eagle". Polymarket founder Shayne Coplan was arrested for "manipulating the election results", and the "Free Shayne Coplan" movement quickly gained traction, forming the "Eagle" icon meme coin. "Free Shayne Coplan" is seen as a tool to fight the judicial injustice of the Democratic Party. At the same time, since the ticker has no name but is a unique representation of the American eagle, it was enthusiastically received by the market on the day of its launch.
To a large extent, the emergence of the "Eagle" narrative reflects dissatisfaction with the political retaliation of the Democratic Party. If there are no further developments in the Shayne Coplan case, the "Eagle" will gradually be forgotten by the market, which is why there is the bizarre phenomenon of "many speculators hoping for its euthanasia". In contrast, PNUT has stronger shaping power and a leading effect in terms of political attributes compared to the Eagle.
AI memecoin
ACT, Aii6z, and GOAT are the market's focus points for AI meme coins. However, the overall logic of AI memecoins is somewhat different from PNUT. For this type of memecoin, the essence is to steal the traffic of already listed AI projects, such as WLD and LPT. Although from a macro perspective, PNUT and AI memes are in a zero-sum game, but in the specific meme track, the two are in a parallel competitive relationship.
Summary
PNUT's core competitive advantages are (1) a perfect animal IP. It is a celebrity animal and a unique squirrel image; (2) an excellent traffic center. It has both in-circle traffic and web2 traffic; (3) a subtle political distance. It has the backing of political attributes, yet can still be listed on exchanges with confidence; (4) Musk's merchandising list. It has become the core of Musk's "merchandising" this round; (5) a verified super explosiveness. It surged 5 times in one day and broke through the $2 billion mark; (6) the most important point is that Peanut has sacrificed itself, and the market can endow it with more meaning and more easily "deify" it.
PNUT has become the culmination of this round of meme cycle. If you find a target with a ceiling higher than the squirrel and more buffs than the squirrel, first of all, my sincere congratulations! Secondly, please quietly tell me~
