Written by Zack Abrams, The Block

Compiled by: Koala, Mars Finance

Popular memecoin issuance platform Pump.fun has already grossed $100 million in revenue from over a million memecoins since its launch in January.

Another popular crypto project, Polymarket, had more trading volume in August than all NFTs on all chains combined, according to data from analytics platform CryptoSlam.

The crypto industry has always attracted a lot of speculators, for better or worse, so it’s no surprise that two of the hottest crypto platforms — memecoin issuance platform Pump.fun and decentralized prediction market Polymarket — are both built on speculation.

Interestingly, the two platforms can be seen as opposites of each other. On Pump.fun, users speculate on meme coins that have no intrinsic value proposition other than brand and community value, meaning it is difficult to predict which coins will stand out and attract fans. On Polymarket, users are encouraged to use all available information when trading market positions, from political elections to how many tweets Elon Musk will send this week.

The crypto industry has always attracted a lot of speculators, for better or worse, so it’s no surprise that two of the hottest crypto platforms — memecoin issuance platform Pump.fun and decentralized prediction market Polymarket — are both built on speculation.

Interestingly, the two platforms can be seen as opposites of each other. On Pump.fun, users speculate on memecoins that have no intrinsic value proposition other than brand and community value, meaning it is difficult to predict which coins will stand out and attract fans. On Polymarket, users are encouraged to use all available information when trading market positions, from political elections to how many tweets Elon Musk will send this week.

But both platforms have experienced meteoric rises. According to the data dashboard of Dune Analytics, Pump.fun recently surpassed $100 million in total cumulative developer revenue since its launch in January 2024. Pump.fun’s developers collect a 1% fee from all transactions on the platform. Pump.fun even recently eliminated the fee for deploying tokens, making it easier than ever for users to create new memecoins.

However, Pump.fun’s daily revenue last Friday was its second-lowest since May 24. Whether the platform can continue to incentivize users to create and trade memecoins will be crucial to its future growth, otherwise the project may become like friend.tech, a once-hot Web3 social platform that has basically stopped making money in the past three months. According to data from The Block, friend.tech’s revenue has dropped significantly.

Polymarket surpasses NFT trading volume

According to data from The Block and CryptoSlam, Polymarket has also achieved a remarkable achievement this month: its trading volume exceeds the sum of all on-chain NFTs. In the past 30 days, the trading volume of NFTs was only about $377 million, while Polymarket's platform reached $463 million in trading volume.

According to The Block, Polymarket has seen a steady increase in active traders since May as the 2024 presidential election approaches. The platform even hired election forecasting expert Nate Silver as an advisor, even though U.S. users are not officially allowed to use the site.

Currently on this prediction market, former President Donald Trump has a slight lead over Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election. Close to $750 million has been bet on the election outcome.