A Beginner's Guide to Meme Coins

Let’s get specific. This article is not going to be discussing larger crypto trading strategy, holding long-term, or investing in specific coins. We’ll be talking about the meme coin niche, and how you can make lifechanging profits in hours.

But what is a meme coin? It’s a term that picked up popularity earlier this year, and largely refers to low effort, low cost cryptocurrencies whose values are largely pegged to trending events, inside jokes, and memes.

The value and profitability of a meme coin is extremely volatile, and is directly correlated with the popularity of the meme it’s referencing.

There are a lot of subtle nuances that we’ll discuss later, but the TL;DR here is that people are buying, holding, and selling meme coins essentially as a joke, and any real or virtual utility is an afterthought.

Oh yes. If you’re reading this article, you’re probably looking for “get rich quick” cheat codes, and meme coins are just about as close to that as you can get (although you can lose your money equally fast).

With the crypto markets as hot as they are, there are a ton of excess profits being funneled into meme coins. If Bitcoin and Ethereum are a crypto trader’s day job, pump.fun and the meme coin market is the thriving casino operating after hours.

Every day, new meme coins launch and explode in value. You can expect to see at least a few hit a market cap of over $1,000,000 after launching for $10,000, meaning early holders are multiplying their money by a factor of 100 every single day.

Okay, we’ve mentioned it a few times, but it’s time we talked about pump.fun. This is the premier meme coin marketplace, and has grown rapidly after launching earlier this year.

Almost all major meme coins start out here, and pump.fun has a number of safeguards and standardizations that cut down on scams and bad actors.

One of the most important is the bonding curve and enforced minimum market cap. Coins launched on pump.fun start with a market cap of around $7,000, which significantly mitigates risk for early buyers. No matter how badly the coin fails, you’ll still be able to cash out for (most) of your initial investment as long as you bought in early.

Thousands of coins launch on pump.fun every day. Their goal is to reach a market cap of around $100,000, at which point they will “graduate” and move onto a Raydium pool. Only a small handful ever accomplish this, but those that do generate enormous profits for early buyers.

We’re not going to get too technical in this article. If you want to know more about pump.fun, you can read their documentation here. If you’re interested in making money on meme coins, just know that pump.fun is where the action is.

That said, we don’t recommend using pump.fun itself to buy coins. As the platform has grown, it’s become increasingly difficult to track coins and stay updated on the new launches.

Fortunately, there are several new aggregators that have sprung up for buying meme coins. Our favorite is ape.pro. This service offers lightning-fast trade times with low transaction fees, a comfortable and customizable user interface, and is geared around tracking coins just as they begin to take off.

To start, visit ape.pro and connect your wallet. They support major platforms like Phantom and Metamask. We strongly recommend using ape.pro’s “Hunt Gems” page. This is split into three tabs: New Creations, Graduating Soon, and Graduated.

If you’re just starting, you’ll want to focus on the New Creations section. This tracks the latest coins launched on pump.fun with at least one transaction.

You can set up a “Quick Buy” amount and buy meme coins with one click on ape.pro. Click a coin to track its current value and monitor transactions. Ape.pro also includes links to the coin’s pump.fun listing, and optional Twitter and website links.

All coins launched on pump.fun are based on Solana. This chain offers low transaction fees and extremely quick transaction times, perfect for meme brokerage.

If you haven’t set up an ape.pro account, use our referral code and enjoy 10% off all transaction fees while trading. Ape.pro already offers the lowest platform fees (0.5%) compared to other popular aggregators, making this the cheapest way to trade meme coins.

Okay, we’ve covered the how, let’s talk about the why. If you’re just getting started buying meme coins, we recommend taking it slow.

First, establish a budget. $500 or so is a good amount to start with, which comes out to around 2 SOL at current prices. Your first few trades should be small, at around 0.1 to 0.3 SOL at a time.

Remember, most coins will fail. Your goal isn’t to go all in on anything, but spread your bets out and look for coins you feel confident in. Your first few buys should be on the New Creations tab, and you’ll be buying early and selling for modest profits.

Focus on coins with low market caps, around $7,000 to $15,000. This will reduce your risk, and you’ll be able to recoup the majority of your investment if the coins fail.

Expect that the majority of the coins you buy will flop. Flipping meme coins is a game of numbers, and it just takes one winning lottery ticket to put you in the green. Don’t get discouraged, don’t get stupid, and stick to your budget.

Remember, the volatility in the meme coin market goes both ways. You can lose your money just as fast as you can make it, so rushing in with no plan or experience can be risky.

Here’s a simple exercise to get started: once you’re set up and ready to buy, set a few hours aside just for watching new coin releases on ape.pro. Don’t buy anything, but pay close attention to recently launched coins.

Take note of which ones catch your eye. Write down coins you like, or open them in new tabs, and periodically check in. It can take days for a coin to graduate from pump.fun.

Compare the coins you’ve tracked against those that graduate. What memes are they referencing? Are they original? How long did they take to graduate? What do they have in common?

Spend some time on the sidelines before you start buying, and you can save yourself some money and stress while you getting started up.

Most meme coin traders are looking for daily “winners”. These are the coins that graduate from pump.fun and skyrocket in value. With how hot the crypto market is right now, we’re seeing multiple coins launch and hit market caps of over $1 million every day.

So, what makes a meme coin explode? Well, about a thousand different reasons. Because it only costs a few dollars to launch a coin on pump.fun, the vast majority of new meme coins are low-effort and doomed to fail.

And it takes community investment for a coin to succeed. Even if you think a coin will do well, it needs hundreds of other people and thousands of dollars of liquidity to pop off. Again, watch, wait, and learn for a few hours before you start making trades.

As new memes go viral on social media, you can expect them to reappear on pump.fun as a meme coin. You can think of investing in these coins as investing in the meme; the earlier the coin launches the more potential there is for profit as the meme tears through Twitter and TikTok.

You’ll want to follow accounts on crypto Twitter and stay updated on the latest memes. The more people that recognize the value of a particular meme coin, the stronger its chances of success.

Ultimately, there is no formula for success in meme coin trading. This market is volatile by design, and coins regularly gain and lose millions of dollars of liquidity in seconds.

Hopefully we’ve given you a good foundation to begin buying and selling meme coins. Remember, this is an incredibly turbulent market. You can lose your money just as fast as you can make it. Some people find that appealing, others are turned off by it.

For now, we recommend setting some time aside to watch the markets on pump.fun or ape.pro, and paying attention to coins you think will do well. There’s a lot more we could cover, but we also believe experience is the best teacher. Expect to hear more crypto-related content from us while the market stays hot.

Remember to use our referral code on ape.pro. You’ll be saving 10% of your platform fees on every transaction, but this opportunity will not last long.

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