The vast majority of meme coins promoted by influencers in X end up “dead” — their value drops by 90% or more within three months.

The attention surrounding meme coins has led many famous X personalities to promote these tokens as a quick way to make money. However, the research by CoinWire shows the unpleasant reality: most meme coins have no value, and many investors face heavy losses.

“Our research reveals a sobering truth: most of these meme coins are, in fact, dead, and the majority of investors end up with significant losses.”

CoinWire report

To understand the meme coin situation, the experts analyzed data from over 1,500 tokens endorsed by 377 influential X users. They selected 377 of them with at least 10,000 followers who frequently promote meme coins. They then compiled a list of 1,567 meme coins that were promoted over the past three months.

Using Dune Analytics, experts collected information on the price when they were first promoted, the current price, and the price after one week, one month, and three months. A meme coin is considered dead if its current value has fallen by 90% or more compared to the initial promotion. 

“76% of Twitter influencers have promoted meme coins that are now dead. Two out of three meme coins they promote are worthless. This means that many influencer-driven promotions essentially set up investors for failure.”

CoinWire report

The real effectiveness of meme coin promotion

The actual situation with meme coins differs significantly from influencers’ positive picture.

Stats show that these projects rarely meet their expectations: after a week, 80% of meme coins promoted by influencers lose 70% of their value.

After a month, about 90% of these tokens lost about 80% in value, and after three months, 86% of them fell in price by 10 times. As analysts note, this trend indicates significant instability and volatility of meme coins backed by influential individuals. In addition, most investors end up facing serious losses, often just a few weeks after investing.

Achieving high returns is almost impossible

One main factor that makes meme coins attractive is their potential to generate significant returns.

However, in reality, this almost never happens. Only 1% of influencers successfully promoted meme coins. Furthermore, only 3% of meme coins promoted by influencers ever achieved such a significant increase.

Interestingly, the more followers an influencer has, the worse the performance of the meme coins they promote. Influencers with over 200,000 followers tend to perform the worst, with their meme coin promotions losing 39% of their investment within a week and 89% of their investment within three months.

In contrast to more prominent influencers, those with fewer than 50,000 followers perform better, with 25% of their revenue positive within a week and a 141% increase within three months. This may indicate that smaller influencers are more sincere in their promotional approaches, while larger ones often prioritize financial gain over the quality of the projects they support.

As for influencer earnings from meme coin promotions, analysts used TweetHunter’s X earnings calculator to estimate the potential profit from a sponsored tweet.

While investors often lose money, influencers benefit from promoting meme coins. They earn an average of $399 for each promotional tweet that attracts about 15,000 views. In this way, influencers promote even the most dubious tokens in the hopes of making a high profit.

Influencer promotion is mostly harmful

The data highlights a disturbing reality: meme coin promotion by influencers is mostly doing more harm than good for ordinary investors. 76% of influencers promote tokens without activity, and the probability of getting the desired 10x return is extremely low.

“Investors need to be cautious, questioning the true value behind these promotions and avoiding decisions driven by social media hype alone.”

CoinWire report

A CoinWire study shows that X meme coin hype is good for influencers but almost always disastrous for investors. Most of these tokens quickly lose their value. The chances of serious profits for investors who believe the buzz are minimal.