PEPE, the meme coin featuring Pepe the Frog, is off to a great start in 2026. Its price jumped by over 20% on January 2nd.
What’s causing this price increase, and will it last long enough to start a new wave of popular, speculative investments in early 2026?
James Wynn Predicts PEPE Market Cap Reaching $69 Billion in 2026
James Wynn, a popular trader on Hyperliquid, believes PEPE could be worth as much as $69 billion by the end of 2026. This prediction has excited investors and led to a significant increase in purchases.
Wynn predicted PEPE’s value could increase dramatically, from a starting point of just $600,000 to potentially billions of dollars. He’s said to have made tens of millions of dollars from this investment, and all transactions were publicly recorded on the blockchain.
Analyst Wynn recently noted that the cryptocurrency PEPE is showing promising signs, drawing parallels to SHIB, which experienced a massive increase in value – jumping from $3.5 billion to $41 billion in less than a month during the last market cycle. Wynn believes PEPE’s current social media engagement is even higher than SHIB’s was, hinting that it might perform just as well, or even better.
James Wynn confidently predicted that the cryptocurrency PEPE will increase in value from $1.7 billion to over $69 billion by 2026, stating he will delete his account if this doesn’t happen.
After investor Jeffrey Wynn predicted PEPE’s success, the cryptocurrency’s price jumped almost 20%. PEPE is currently valued at around $2 billion, and Wynn believes its price could potentially increase by 35 times its present value.
Wynn experienced some setbacks with PEPE. When the price of PEPE started to fall in July, he made risky bets using high leverage, which resulted in him losing his investment multiple times.
Analyst SΞA noted that the recent increase in PEPE’s price was likely due to US tax laws, specifically a practice called tax-loss harvesting.
According to SΞA, many U.S. investors experienced losses by the end of 2025 and decided to sell their investments at the very last moment. By doing so, they turned potential losses into actual losses, which allowed them to lower their taxes.
As we moved into the 2026 tax year, I noticed a significant surge in buying pressure for PEPE. Many investors who were already optimistic about its potential quickly moved to repurchase their holdings. Looking at the data from CoinGecko, PEPE’s daily trading volume jumped to over $600 million – the highest we’ve seen in a month. This indicates a strong renewed interest in the asset.
Multiple Meme Coins Rally in Early 2026, Reviving Hopes of a Meme Season
At the beginning of 2026, PEPE wasn’t the only meme coin to see big gains. Milady Cult Coin (CULT) actually doubled in value when Vitalik Buterin announced “Milady is back” and updated his online profile picture. Floki (FLOKI) also experienced a 10% price increase.
Investor POΞ believes the recent surge in ‘God candles’ and the popularity of the PEPE meme signal the start of a significant bullish market phase. They suggest Pepe the Frog consistently appears as a leading indicator of positive market trends.
Despite these isolated surges, most meme coins remain down 70%–90% from their peaks last year.
According to data from CryptoQuant, memecoins still represent a small portion of the overall crypto market and haven’t shown any significant signs of bouncing back.
Investor CRG observed that the recent downturn felt widespread, impacting not just ‘memecoins’ but the entire altcoin market. They noted that while there’s a recent recovery, it’s uncertain if it will last, especially since Bitcoin hasn’t demonstrated strong upward momentum. The market could easily fall again. However, CRG added that memecoins often lead the way when investors start to show even a small appetite for risk.
The popularity of meme coins is still a hot topic. Some investors prefer altcoins built on solid foundations, while others think meme coins are key to capturing public interest in crypto. Those who support meme coins believe they bring in new, everyday investors and can help the entire crypto market grow in value.
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2026-01-02 08:22