Author: Frank, PANews

On March 8th, Pump.fun surpassed $1 billion in cumulative revenue, becoming the first platform on Solana to reach this milestone and firmly establishing itself as the most prominent money-making machine in the MEME sector. However, after the hype subsided, the question is no longer just "who made the most money," but rather how much business these platforms that started with MEME actually have left.

Looking at leading ecosystem projects like Pump.fun, GMGN, Four.meme, Axiom, as well as Photon, BullX, and BONK, the answer is becoming increasingly clear: MEME has not disappeared; it's just that business is becoming more concentrated among the top players, and the differentiation between chains and platforms is becoming more and more obvious.

Pump.fun: An "absolute oligopoly" that transcends bull and bear markets, yet its hundreds of millions in profits are difficult to retain.

If the last MEME boom was a relentless gold rush, then Pump.fun was undoubtedly the most profitable tollbooth in that gold rush town. Public data shows that as of March 2026, Pump.fun's cumulative total revenue had exceeded $1 billion. Of this, approximately $321 million was contributed in 2024, and this figure further increased to approximately $664 million in 2025. Starting in 2026, the MEME industry experienced a severe downturn, but the impact on Pump.fun seems relatively minor, still generating approximately $98.3 million in revenue to date.

From a market perspective, Pump.fun's dominance in the Solana ecosystem has been further strengthened. Taking March 15th as an example, Pump.fun accounted for 99.1% of token creation, 94.8% of graduation tokens, and approximately 93% of the day's trading volume. On that day, Pump.fun issued 24,938 tokens, while LetsBonk issued only 132, Bags 50, and Moonshot 28. Other token issuance platforms are completely unable to compete with Pump.fun in terms of daily issuance volume.

Looking back at Pump.fun's own data, it's quite remarkable that it has maintained a relatively high level. Roughly calculated data from the past two weeks shows that Pump.fun currently has an average daily token issuance of approximately 29,700, an average daily active wallet count of approximately 157,700, an average daily trading volume of approximately $93.65 million, and an average daily revenue of approximately $870,000. At the same time, the graduation rate, long considered a weakness of the platform, has also shown signs of improvement, recently even surging to around 1.70%. While the specific reasons behind this short-term peak are still unclear, Pump.fun's graduation efficiency is indeed recovering.

However, while fee generation remains robust, this doesn't mean that all of Pump.fun's revenue is fully converted into protocol profits. Firstly, a large portion of the fees is allocated to creators and limited partners (LPs). Secondly, aside from creator revenue, the remaining revenue is used for token buybacks. In the first quarter of 2026, Pump.fun generated $227 million in fees, of which $123 million went to creators and LPs, and almost all of the remaining $100 million was used for token buybacks.

The problem is that the buybacks didn't automatically translate into a price increase. As of March 16th, the price of PUMP was approximately $0.002, still about 76.21% lower than its all-time high of $0.0088. A more reasonable explanation is that the buybacks only served to support the price and maintain the narrative, but were insufficient to reverse the trend of valuation compression across the entire MEME sector. In other words, Pump.fun's cash flow machine is still running at high speed, but the market is no longer willing to give it a higher valuation multiple simply because it "makes money," as it did in the previous boom.

In summary, the market landscape for Pump.fun remains relatively stable. Although the entire meme coin sector has experienced a downturn, it's primarily its competitors that have failed, which has actually strengthened Pump.fun's dominance. If the market experiences another boom, Pump.fun may reap even greater benefits.

GMGN: BSC's quarterly revenue increased fivefold compared to the previous quarter, making it a "new traffic darling".

GMGN's revenue experienced another explosive growth in the first quarter of 2026. Total revenue for the first quarter of 2026 reached $25.31 million, nearly five times the $5.64 million in the fourth quarter of 2025. This quarter's revenue also became the second highest single-quarter revenue in GMGN's history (only lower than the $40.81 million in the first quarter of 2025).

A closer look at this revenue structure reveals that it primarily benefits from the BSC chain. Starting in October 2025, GMGN's transaction volume on the BSC chain began to significantly surpass that of Solana, and this trend stabilized by 2026. Currently, the proportion of BSC chain transactions on GMGN is nearly three times that of the Solana chain.

Looking at the overall transaction volume, GMGN saw some improvement in both user activity and transaction volume in the first quarter of 2026, but the increase was not as significant as the revenue changes suggested. Therefore, from this perspective, while GMGN's revenue did increase in the first quarter of 2026, the explosive growth is likely due to a statistical issue with Defilama (BSC chain revenue data is empty before October 2025).

However, this growth was primarily driven by a surge in BSC on-chain MEME transaction volume in January, generating $16.34 million in total chain revenue that month. This figure dropped to $5.18 million in February, and is currently around $3.77 million in March. The overall level for the first quarter of this year is similar to that of the same period in 2025.

Four.meme: The "face" of BSC, with daily income only a fraction of its peak.

If Pump.fun consumes almost all the traffic on the Solana launch platform, then on BSC, the closest similar player is Four.meme.

According to DeFiLlama data, as of March 16, Four.meme's protocol revenue for the first quarter of 2026 reached $16 million, significantly lower than the $54.24 million in the fourth quarter of 2025, but still showing a slight rebound in monthly revenue changes this year.

According to Dune's tracking data for the past 10 days, Four.meme issues an average of 4,858 tokens daily, has an average of 5,749 users daily, and only 25.7 tokens are actually listed on the DEX Pancake daily, further reducing its short-term graduation rate to around 0.53%. These data indicate that Four.meme is currently operating at a low level, with current revenue dropping to the $200,000-$300,000 level compared to its peak daily revenue of $4.22 million in October 2025.

In comparison, Pump.fun's estimated daily issuance over the past two weeks is still around 29,700 tokens, with a daily trading volume of approximately $93.65 million. Clearly, as the main platforms for MEME tokens on the Solana and BSC chains, Four.meme and Pump.fun differ significantly in scale and token quality, reflecting the different development stages of MEME tokens on these two chains.

Axiom: Bidding farewell to high growth, now mired in a slump in trading volume.

If GMGN's growth in the first quarter of 2026 was more like benefiting from the BSC rotation, then Axiom's situation was almost the opposite.

According to DeFiLlama data, as of now, the protocol's revenue in the first quarter of 2026 is approximately $29.03 million, higher than GMGN's $25.31 million in the same period.

However, Axiom's current problem lies in its continuously declining business. According to DeFiLlama's quarterly revenue data, Axiom's protocol revenue reached as high as $133 million and $150 million in the second and third quarters of 2025, respectively, but fell back to $60.66 million in the fourth quarter of 2025, and is currently at $29.03 million in the first quarter of 2026. Compared to its most frenzied period last year, its business volume has clearly shrunk. This can be seen by comparing it with GMGN. Although both are in a decline after a peak, GMGN's revenue still has occasional rebounds, while Axiom seems unable to recover.

For Axiom, it is no longer a tool that simply relies on the MEME craze, but rather a mature trading machine that has withstood multiple rounds of market testing. Compared to GMGN, which is still talking about growth potential, Axiom's room for imagination seems to be shrinking.

Photon, BullX, and BONK: The "Laggards" After the Tide Recedes

Compared to GMGN, which is still rebounding, and Axiom, which is still maintaining its leading position, the revenue curves of Photon, BullX, and BONKbot all more clearly entered a downward trend in 2026.

According to DeFiLlama data as of March 16, Photon's cumulative revenue was approximately $438 million, but its quarterly revenue has declined from $122.8 million in the first quarter of 2025 to $32.31 million in the second quarter, $18.99 million in the third quarter, $5.29 million in the fourth quarter, and only $4.52 million so far in the first quarter of 2026, showing a near-step-like downward trend.

BullX's cumulative revenue is approximately $203 million, but it has also experienced a rapid contraction. Quarterly revenue dropped from $87.37 million in the first quarter of 2025 to $14.25 million in the second quarter, $3.86 million in the third quarter, $878,000 in the fourth quarter, and only $491,000 so far in the first quarter of 2026.

BONKbot's decline was not as steep, but it has also clearly receded. According to DeFiLlama data, its cumulative revenue is approximately $93.57 million. In the first quarter of 2025, its revenue was $12.61 million, which then fell to $3.4 million in the second quarter, $2.85 million in the third quarter, $1.85 million in the fourth quarter, and $1.84 million so far in the first quarter of 2026.

However, the BONK ecosystem itself has not died out. As of now, BONK.fun's protocol revenue for the first quarter of 2026 is approximately $8.51 million, already higher than the $7.06 million in the fourth quarter of 2025. Of this, approximately $6 million came from Bonk.Fun and approximately $1.84 million from BonkBot in the current quarter.

Looking at this MEME coin massacre, we can easily draw a conclusion: the MEME track has not disappeared, but the era of ruthless competition has come to a complete end, and the speed of the reshuffling far exceeded everyone's expectations.

After the tide recedes, the platforms that truly remain will no longer be just those who moved quickly, but rather those who have created a complete closed loop encompassing launch, trading, liquidity, and fee collection. If the next MEME boom begins, these same platforms will most likely be the first to reap the rewards.

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