Hristina Vasileva
Raydium (RAY) continues its march to influence, following a recent Bithumb listing of a Korean won trading pair. RAY tokens peaked at $5.90, reflecting the listing pump and a year of growth from meme token trading.
Raydium (RAY) rose to an all-time high at $5.90 after the South Korean exchange Bithumb added a Korean won trading pair. The token also reflected this year’s rise of the Raydium DEX, the busiest Solana hub for meme token trading.
RAY is still far from its all-time peak in 2021 at $16.48. At that time, the token rallied based on general market hype, with much lower real trading volumes and fee production. The most recent RAY rally is also happening with sustainably high volumes, lasting longer than the March-April rally.
RAY is still not as reactive as expected, despite its Binance listing with a highly active trading pair. The token is still seen as a utility tool, and has not invited outsized speculation. Open interest for RAY even slowed down to $7.53M, as the token still hovers outside the top 50 of crypto assets.
The recent addition of a trading pair and the price rally suggest RAY is seen as a proxy for Solana’s performance. At this price range, RAY sets expectations for a bigger rally to its all-time high. The token is fully unlocked, but not all RAY tokens are in the hands of the community. Out of a total supply of 555M RAY, 111M are part of the team allocation.
RAY is also considered undervalued as its total value locked surpassed $2.2B, with a market capitalization of circulating tokens at $1.7B. Raydium’s locked liquidity rose to levels not seen since 2021, based on both low-level meme token activity and on targeted high-liquidity pairs.
The project has a fully diluted value above $3B. RAY tokens are partially kept off the market for staking, but large-scale holders can sell the additional RAY from rewards. RAY staking offers 4.48% annualized rate, with more than $245M in locked liquidity.
The Raydium DEX has more than $4.8M in daily trades, with a constant flux for the most active pairs. Raydium still depends on a turnover of new hot memes, or returning meme tokens with heightened activity. On a daily basis, Raydium became the biggest fee producer following Tether’s smart contract. Raydium reached a new peak of $11.9M in fees, once again surpassing both Solana and Jito.
Raydium remained busy with inflows from Pump.fun. The token launch platform produced a new record of more than 46,700 tokens in a single day. Even with only 1% of tokens graduating to Raydium, the DEX remains busy, carrying a mix of new, trending, and returning tokens.
Bithumb extends KRW listings with Ponke
Along with Raydium, Bithumb listed Ponke (PONKE) against the KRW. PONKE gained a new market just weeks after Binance listed the meme token. PONKE still has no Binance spot market, which has been the biggest growth factor for meme assets. Instead, the token has a perpetual futures market, which is seen as a test run before a full listing.
After the news, PONKE rallied to an all-time high, touching $0.79. The token recently gained representation on Binance, producing a rally in the $0.45 range. PONKE still has a market capitalization under $500M, in one of the most competitive token ranges. The asset is seen as entering a new price discovery stage, potentially growing above a $1B valuation. Listings on South Korean exchanges have helped lift assets like Popcat (POPCAT) and Cat in a dogs world (MEW). Those markets are highly selective about new listings, aiming to add tokens with a long trading history and liquidity.
PONKE has a strong community of more than 153K X followers, compared to around 80K for POPCAT. For now, PONKE has remained relatively subdued as other hotter memes had their turn. The cult community is prepared to hold for an even higher valuation.
Until the addition of the KRW pair, PONKE mostly relied on Raydium and Bybit. The token belongs to the animal meme subset, which still manages to produce the most widely accepted tokens.
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