Model Portfolio of 10 Large Memecoins Lost 78.74% Over Nearly 14 Months

An equal-weight model of 10 large memecoins lost 78.74% from Jan. 1, 2025, to Feb. 20, 2026, while Bitcoin (BTC) fell 30.68% and U.S. stock and gold fund proxies gained. The comparison shows how the modeled portfolio diverged from familiar market benchmarks.

The tracked memecoin category had a market capitalization of about $30.8 billion at approximately 4:01 p.m. ET (20:01 UTC) on Oct. 21, 2026. Market capitalization reflects token prices and circulating supply; it does not measure how much cash entered or left the category. Earlier coverage of Pump.fun trading activity examined token trades, a different measure from category value.

Bitcoin fell 30.68% over the comparison period. The U.S. stock fund proxy gained 17.84%, while the gold fund proxy rose 92.46%. Those figures describe the proxy funds, not every U.S. stock or gold investment.

The model tracked 10 of the largest memecoins using weekly prices. Tokens also had to remain price-trackable through the end of the sample, leaving out coins that stopped trading. The results therefore do not represent all memecoin launches.

A separate sample of 150 memecoins with centralized-exchange prices had a median 17.2 days from first trade to peak price, followed by a median 370 days from peak to a 95% drawdown. One-quarter of the tokens reached a peak within 1.6 days. The exchange-price requirement excludes many launchpad tokens, so the sample does not capture the full range of memecoin lifespans. Earlier coverage examined these memecoin lifecycle estimates.