Zora’s Creator Coins Propel Base Past Solana in Daily Token Launches—Is This the New Normal?

Base just flipped Solana in daily token launches—thanks to Zora’s creator coin frenzy. But here’s the real question: Is this a sustainable shift or just another crypto hype cycle?

### The Battle of the Chains Heats Up

Base, Coinbase’s layer-2 darling, is now the go-to for token launches—at least for today. Solana, the former speed king, just got outraced. Blame it on Zora’s creator coins, the latest shiny object for degens and influencers alike.

### Creator Coins: Fuel or Fad?

These tokens promise to monetize clout—because what’s more 2025 than turning your Twitter followers into a liquidity pool? But let’s be real: When the next ‘vampire attack’ drains liquidity, will anyone remember these launches?

### The Cynic’s Corner

Another day, another metric for chains to brag about—until the next one steals the spotlight. Remember when ‘transactions per second’ was the flex? Now it’s ‘token launches per day.’ Progress, or just a fancy way to repackage the same speculation?

This was largely driven by a powerful new mechanism that turns social content into tradable tokens. Each time a user posts on the Base app, Zora’s smart contracts automatically mint an ERC-20 token linked to that piece of content. This token or “creator coin” is then launched on Base and becomes instantly tradable. The original creator then receives a portion of the supply and earns fees every time the token is traded, turning every post into a potential revenue stream.

This new creator economy has led to over 1.6 million tokens launched and nearly 3 million traders participating, generating around $470 million in trading volume since the Base app relaunch. The flagship ZORA token itself now boasts a market cap of around $200 million—an increase of approximately 185% from its ~$70 million valuation in April. It peaked at about $310 million in late July before retracing to current levels.

Other notable creator coins on Base have also achieved substantial market caps and are driving substantial trading volumes, including:

• Zeebu (ZBU), with a market cap of $487.9 million, though daily trading remains relatively light at $371K—suggesting strong valuation but limited liquidity.
• Wormhole (W) follows closely, boasting a $355.8 million market cap and a healthy $22.6 million in 24-hour volume, making it one of the more actively traded tokens in the ecosystem.
• Yield Guild Games (YGG) holds a $81.3 million market cap and sees $12 million in daily volume.
• Zentry (ZENT) rounds out the group with a $54 million valuation and $6.7 million in 24-hour volume.

For context, the Base app, which has served as a user-friendly front end to the Zora’s creator token ecosystem, was rebranded from Coinbase Wallet in mid-July. It’s now a comprehensive SocialFi platform that combines social networking (powered by Farcaster), USD Coin (USDC) payments, onchain identity management, and dApp discovery.

What have you bought on the @baseapp today?

I was checking out @zora creater coins 🚕 💨 pic.twitter.com/bFM3BemEIg

Are Zora’s creator coins on Base more than a hype cycle?

Despite the rapid growth in these creator coins, much of the activity is driven by short-term traders who are after quick profits, which isn’t sustainable. To address this, Jesse Pollak, the creator of Base, has suggested that crypto funds step up by taking sizable, long-term positions—such as $5 million or more— in creator coin indexes, calling this a “a relatively no-brainer opportunity to win as the onchain creator economy grows.”

I WOULD pick an overall $ spend, then come up with some rough heuristics for what a high potential creator coin looks like (eg audience, content quality, commitment to it, etc), then allocate across all existing creators that fit it and build tooling to buy into new ones early