Pump.fun DEX PumpSwap TVL Breaks $100M Driven By Memecoin Comeback

In its less than two months of life, PumpSwap, the decentralized exchange (DEX) from top Solana memecoin launchpad pump.fun, has been up only, suggesting reports of the death of memecoins have been greatly exaggerated.

Today, May 9, PumpSwap’s total value locked (TVL) pushed over $100 million for the first time, continuing to break new all-time highs.

Launched on March 19, at the bottom of what’s starting to look like a slump rather than a collapse in the memecoin sector, PumpSwap’s other metrics are also showing steady growth. Daily volume and market share have also been steadily rising, according to Dune Analytics. While there are peaks and valleys, the overall trend is up.

When tokens graduate with sufficient sales from pump.fun they migrate onto PumpSwap, which took over the gig from the Raydium DEX.

Pump.fun saw its output shrink dramatically starting in February, after Argentine president Javier Milei was involved in a high-profile memecoin scandal with the Libra token, which he posted about on his official X account, causing its price to pump before crashing 90%.

After that high-profile incident, the end of the memcoin craze was widely proclaimed by vocal industry leaders, including Castle Island Ventures general partner Nic Carter, who said in an extended X post on Feb. 19: “Memecoins are unquestionably over.”

And yet, in the month of May there has been only one day in which PumpSwap’s daily volume fell below $500 million, and its cumulative volume has reached over $18 billion in just 50 days.

On May 5, PumpSwap hit an all-time high of almost 500,000 daily active wallets, a combination of new and recurring users. And while the number of new users varies wildly day to day, recurring users have been going steadily up. The same can be said for daily swaps.

Memecoins on a tear

Of the top 10 memecoins by market capitalization, all are up double digits over the past week and many close to 100% on the month. On the monthly chart, Pudgy Penguins’ PENGU is the clear leader, up over 230%. PEPE is in the lead on the week, up over 40%, followed by PENGU with 18% growth over seven days.

As The Defiant reported earlier today, a new report from Solidus Labs says almost 99% of memecoin launches on pump.fun are rug pulls or pump-and-dump schemes.