Prominent crypto trader Ansem has reignited the debate over meme coins versus earlier altcoin cycles, arguing that many 2017 initial coin offering tokens were essentially meme coins with white papers. In a series of posts on X, he said founders of ICO-era projects often misrepresented their intentions, making current skepticism toward meme coins inconsistent. During the 2017 boom, thousands of ICOs raised billions of dollars by promising revolutionary blockchain applications, but many failed to deliver or were later exposed as scams. Ansem’s view is that modern meme coins such as Dogecoin and Shiba Inu are more transparent because they openly admit their primary goal is to attract attention and drive prices, whereas earlier altcoin founders pretended to be building serious technology while using misleading marketing.
His commentary lands as the SEC has cracked down on several ICOs from the 2017 era and has also taken action against meme coin projects for alleged securities violations. Ansem, who inspired the Solana-based meme coin ANSEM, has influence among retail meme coin traders, and his stance could shift sentiment among his followers.
At the same time, the 2026 presale market is presenting multiple narratives. MemeToro has entered Stage 6 of its presale, with $MT priced at a baseline of $0.00350 and approaching the $100,000 fundraising milestone. The project is developing an AI-powered launchpad on BNB Chain, including automated security scanning to detect developer backdoors and honeypots. AlphaPepe has progressed to Stage 20, raising more than $2.5 million from over 11,100 unique wallet holders, with ALPE trading around $0.02789 to $0.02817 and a limited 48-hour Bonus Drop offering up to 200% additional ALPE. The team has indicated planned CEX partnerships with Azbit and BiFinance.
Pepeto has surpassed $10.65 million in funding and is building an Ethereum-based ecosystem with PepetoSwap, a zero-fee decentralized exchange, and a bridge connecting Ethereum, BNB Chain, and Solana. It is also developing an AI token-screening engine. Remittix, focused on decentralized payments and cross-border transfers, has reported $16.7 million raised across its funding lifecycle, with an Ethereum-based RTX token capped at 1.5 billion supply.
For investors, the takeaway is that attention-driven meme assets and presale projects carry significant risk. Ansem’s argument highlights the speculative nature of crypto markets, while the presale projects show that AI, DeFi, and payments narratives are becoming increasingly intertwined with memecoin infrastructure.
