Two meme coins flip on Biden news
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If you want to see how quickly markets can react, just take a look at a relevant crypto asset when big news breaks.
Why it matters: The blockchain industry claims it has the tools to better price everything.
- Yesterday, President Biden dropped out of the race for president and threw his support behind his vice president, Kamala Harris.
This chart shows two meme coins on Solana, Kamala Horris (KAMA) and Jeo Boden (BODEN).
- They were trading at very little value yesterday. For context, BODEN traded at 95 cents in April, but it's been mostly falling since.
- It hasn't been above 10 cents since the disastrous debate.
- As soon as the news hit, the value of BODEN and KAMA flipped in price (all of that happening on volume that amounted only to tens of thousands of dollars).
The latest: KAMA is up more than 30% in the last 24 hours. It broke 2 cents yesterday, but it's back around 1 cent again.
- The day's events have not had a huge impact on meme coins made to evoke former President Trump. The biggest, the MAGA meme coin, is down over 4% over the last 24 hours and has lost over 14% over the last week, though it had a small, fleeting bump after yesterday's news.
The intrigue: But MAGA is on Ethereum, which lacks a noteworthy Biden coin. On Solana, Doland Tremp (TREMP), a fellow traveler with KAMA and BODEN, is up nearly 5% over the last day (though down from its peak yesterday).
The big picture: Yesterday was a huge day of self-congratulation for the crypto world, which feels like it nailed Biden's real prospects.
- Polymarket, the favorite site for placing bets on real events among traders, opened a market last fall over whether or not Biden would ultimately be the Democratic party's nominee.
- As Biden resisted calls to drop out, the market largely shrugged it off, calling the odds of him leaving to be more likely than not since the debate — mostly.
- Elections are very noisy events though, so fans of futurity might be making themselves overconfident.
By the numbers: Polymarket has had a great year. Dune Analytics shows that June was easily its best month ever, and July has already topped it.
- In May it did $63 million in volume, $112 million in June and July has already seen $210 million.
- Yesterday was the site's biggest day in volume and traders, ever.
- In theory, more liquidity should yield better predictions.
What we're watching: The market for who will be the Democratic running mate.
- The chatter says Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, but that market has been going back and forth between him and North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper.
