On April 17, 2023, an anonymous team launched PEPE — a memecoin on Ethereum based on Matt Furie’s frog. The launch had no presale, no team allocation, no roadmap, no whitepaper. The website was a single page with a Pepe image and a contract address. The team described it as “the most memeable memecoin in existence.” Within 24 hours, PEPE had a market cap of $5 million.
It quickly became a phenomenon. Day after day, PEPE doubled. Then doubled again. By May 5, 2023 — just over two weeks after launch — PEPE’s market cap had crossed $1.5 billion. Early buyers became overnight millionaires. The 2022 crypto winter had just ended, and PEPE was the first sign that the meme economy was back. The frog had returned, and this time he was wearing a price chart.
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