BNB Smart Chain still logs a return of users, after years of being overshaded by Ethereum and Solana. The chain, which offers relatively low fees, is becoming the arena for a new wave of memes.
BNB Smart Chain is attracting smart money away from Base as it turns into one of the new hubs for meme tokens. Binance’s network also aims to tap the former Solana meme traders, who have grown tired of rug pulls and cabal token launches.
Nansen research shows a shift of smart money whales from Base to BNB Smart Chain. Solana is also slowing down, while BNB Chain activity is rising, as reflected by DEX traffic.
Interesting shift: Smart Money activity has been migrating from Base to BNB over the past few days. pic.twitter.com/Gy0DtnIq4a
— Laveen | Nansen 🧭 🐧 (@itslaveen) February 19, 2025
The shift from Base is also due to liquidity and wallets abandoning the AI agent trend. Smart money trackers noted big outflows from VIRTUAL and AIXBT, with liquidity seeking new active trends.
BNB Chain and the Binance ecosystem have also signaled they are trying to catch up with the AI agent trend. Recently, the BNBAI agent became the top project in the space, becoming a launch platform with staking opportunities.
BNB Smart Chain to expand share of meme activity
The shift to BNB Smart Chain happened after Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao’s increased social media presence had an outsized effect on the platform’s new token launches. DEX activity has also grown in the past months as more users have flocked to PancakeSwap. After the shift in activity, BNB DEX carried over $2.34B in traffic, starting to catch up with Solana. In hindsight, Solana DEX traffic peaked in October 2024 and is now returning to baseline.
BNB still holds a small fraction of meme tokens, as Solana carries over 95% of new assets. However, Solana activity has slowed down dramatically since January 20, opening the doorway for new players in the meme niche. BNB Chain has already earned top positions during the 2021 bull market and aims to recover its previous influence.
BNB Chain is trying to revive, as Solana trading is slowing down dramatically. | Source: Dune Analytics
Solana still carries over $300M in meme token trades, with just $2.1M for BNB Chain. The biggest bid for visibility would be the adoption of four.meme, the new Binance platform for meme launches.
The drive to popularize BNB Chain arrives at a time of general meme token fatigue. Despite this, there are signs BNB Chain may be catching up and taking users and volumes from all other networks.
After the aggressive Solana culture of meme launches, BNB Chain aims to offer a more balanced approach. The chain already carries legacy tokens from older markets but is now adding another wave of TGEs.
Binance ecosystem offers chances for meme promotion
BNB memes are also more rare, but last a bit longer. Four.meme initially started with up to 2,072 daily launches but remained far from the level of Pump.fun. In the past week, fewer than a dozen memes appeared on Four.meme.
Binance has also taken up the process of vetting and curating memes while offering various listing tiers. Four.meme not only launches tokens but promotes and curates some of them. The ecosystem has also added Binance Alpha, which selects some of the best recent projects for daily recommendations.
The latest expansion of Binance meme activity is mostly tied to the newly launched BROCCOLI token. While not official, BROCCOLI tapped the fame of CZ Zhao’s dog. The asset drew in some of the biggest smart money inflows and was among the top traded assets on DEX, based on recent Alphanomics data.
Smart money follows not just token creation but also assets that gain social media promotion and visibility. However, even for BNB Chain, promotion or positive effects from CZ Zhao are not guaranteed.
Following the recent popularity of the BNB Chain ecosystem, the native token BNB remained in the green. The asset traded at $656.61, still displacing SOL in the top 5 crypto coins and tokens.
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