PVP Arena Heat is Back, Can PumpSwap Reignite the Solana Ecosystem?

Original Article Title: A review on the current state of the 'Trenches'
Original Article Author: @nicodotfun
Original Article Translation: zhouzhou, BlockBeats

Editor's Note: The Pumpfun ecosystem remains active even in a bear market, with the launch of PumpSwap driving trading activity and daily volume reaching 3-5 billion USD, resulting in significant fee revenue. Despite a decrease in users, veteran players in the trenches remain active, and new coin projects are more popular than old ones. Memecoins continue to be the most attractive speculative tool in the Solana ecosystem, with low barriers to entry and high volatility continuing to attract new liquidity.

Below is the original content (slightly reorganized for better readability):

I've been entrenched in the 'Trenches' for a while now, while many on Crypto Twitter have long declared the trenches to be "dead."

Indeed, the trading volume of memecoins is not what it used to be a few months ago, and the $TRUMP coin can be said to have reached a local peak in terms of memecoin popularity, trading volume, and liquidity attraction.

However, that was when $SOL surged to $290, BTC exceeded $100,000, and the whole bull market was in full swing.

Subsequently, BTC retraced to the $74k-88k range, SOL briefly dropped to a local low of $95. But now, SOL has risen back to 140+ (a 46% increase in 15 days), BTC has also reclaimed the 90k level, so it's time to reassess the current situation.

Although SOL's price is not yet high, combined with the overall bearish market sentiment and a general sense of fatigue, the data presents a different picture. Let's take a look at the data up to April:

So far, @pumpdotfun has generated approximately $650 million in total trading volume. In April alone, its daily trading volume fluctuated between $1 million and $2.7 million, with a daily average ranging from $1.5 million to $2 million, placing it at the higher end of this range.

After SOL reached a high point and the $TRUMP coin frenzy peaked, the trading volume experienced a temporary decline. However, by April, the trading volume had started to significantly recover.

With the launch of pumpswap and the almost "instant migration" experience, the gameplay around the "migration event" has become smoother, enhancing the overall trading experience. This can be seen in the weekly increase in pump total trading volume.

As of now, pump has already minted 9.7 million tokens. In April alone, there were new coins launched daily ranging from 20,000 to 40,000, with approximately 100 to 350 coins "graduating" (i.e., entering the trading pool) each day, resulting in a graduation rate of around 0.4% to 0.8%.

The gradual decrease in the graduation rate is synchronous with the decrease in user numbers and overall trading volume. This also indicates that PVP (player versus player) elements within the "trenches" are now higher—some small groups will band together to control the price at the initial coin launch and then engage in price manipulation against each other. Once they realize they cannot attract sufficient liquidity to continue token pairing, they quickly opt to give up and exit.

Active User Situation

During the peak period (from December 2024 to February 2025), there were around 200,000 to 400,000 users daily trading the memecoin on pumpfun. Since then, the number of users has been steadily declining and has not been able to exceed 200,000 for the past two months.

Currently, there are approximately 150,000 active wallets daily, with a relatively balanced distribution between new and old wallets. However, it is worth noting that most "trench players" use multiple wallets for transactions and occasionally switch between active wallets.

Trading Bot Data

As everyone is aware, most memecoin trading activity now occurs through the top five terminals, including: @AxiomExchange, @bullx_io, @tradewithPhoton, @gmgnai, and @TrojanOnSolana.

Axiom1.7-3 10k $20M - $33M 700k - 1.5M Txns

Bullx2-3 10k $20M - $33M 200k - 400k Txns

Photon1.8-2.7 10k $30M - $50M 250k - 350k Txns

GMGN1 10k - 18k $8M - $20M 180k - 290k Txns

Trojan1.4-2.5 10k $7M - $30M ~200k Txns

This data broadly aligns with the overall trend we are seeing - over 100k active users daily with a total trading volume exceeding $100M.

Overall, across these platforms and other relevant venues, there is approximately over $200M worth of SOL liquidity actively circulating within the memecoin ecosystem.

PumpSwap Data

PumpSwap currently sees a daily trading volume ranging from $3B to $4.8B, accounting for 9%-19% of Solana DEX volume. Since all new pumpfun coins are currently being minted and traded on PumpSwap, this also indicates that a considerable portion of old coins are still actively trading on platforms like Raydium or Meteora.

PumpSwap is a very clever move by the pumpfun team

They have set a 0.25% transaction fee, with 0.02% going to LPs (Liquidity Providers) and 0.05% to the protocol itself.

After being live for about a month, PumpSwap has already accumulated approximately $25 million in fees (ranging from $100,000 to $240,000 per day), with about $20 million going to LP and the remaining $5 million going into the protocol's pocket.

And this number is still growing as PumpSwap's market share continues to expand. We can clearly see the trend: people are more willing to trade new coins rather than old ones.

This preference aligns with my assessment of the memecoin development path: the "trench" is becoming increasingly difficult to navigate because the people who have stayed are mostly seasoned veterans who have endured the period of SOL price decline, low trading volumes, and user attrition, yet still persist as hardcore players in the field.

The true driving force of the memecoin ecosystem comes from "new liquidity," which is the influx of new users.

These new users initially were actually some mainstream coin HODLers who suffered losses or industry old-timers, who, in pursuit of faster returns, turned to the embrace of memes.

As this ecosystem continues to expand, more and more retail investors are also beginning to "dip their toes in the trench's deep waters."

Memecoins are still the most suitable speculative vehicle, and Solana is like the main arena of the casino. These coins are easy to understand, have a low entry barrier, and for newcomers, the returns on success are often highly asymmetric—winning once can result in gains of several times over.

Moreover, there is abundant content, with something new happening every day, and everything can be tokenized: people, content, events, memes... In comparison, DeFi projects make people feel bored and troubled, as they require monitoring strategies, understanding mechanisms, have low operational limits, and high risks.

If you were to ask me to choose a few targets to bet on outside of memes, it would probably be only Hyperliquid and its ecosystem, along with fartcoin—after all, hot air does rise (laughs).

Do you think the trench is dead?

No, the battle has just begun, and the mission is far from over.

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