Casey Rodarmor, the founder of the Runes protocol, had made a bold statement that if the market value of the Runes ecosystem does not reach 1 billion US dollars within one month of its release, he would commit ritual suicide. Now that one month has passed and the market value of the Runes ecosystem has not reached 1 billion US dollars, Casey Rodarmor has responded to this.
In sync with Bitcoin’s fourth halving, the Runes protocol went live on the 20th and initially sparked a frenzy. This drew attention to Casey, the founder of the Ordinals and Runes protocols, and his earlier statement in March where he declared that if the market value of the Runes ecosystem does not reach 1 billion US dollars within one month of its release, he would commit ritual suicide.
Now, one month after the launch of the Runes protocol’s mainnet, according to GeniiData, the total market value of the Runes ecosystem is only 935 million US dollars. The long-term average market value of the Runes ecosystem has never exceeded 1 billion US dollars. The 9-day average reached a high of 998.6 million US dollars, and the total market value on the 18th briefly exceeded 1 billion US dollars, but the daily average was 993.6 million US dollars.
Currently, the top three projects in the Runes ecosystem by market value are:
– DOG・GO・TO・THE・MOON, with a market value of 256.16 million US dollars
– PUPS・WORLD・PEACE, with a market value of 158.75 million US dollars
– RSIC・GENESIS・RUNE, with a market value of 158.27 million US dollars
Regarding the failure of the total market value of the Runes ecosystem to reach 1 billion US dollars, Casey jokingly stated today that he may not actually commit suicide. However, making random statements to manipulate market sentiment, failing to fulfill promises, and joking about it have also caused dissatisfaction among some members of the community.
The Runes protocol, which attracted much attention, initially triggered a frenzy when it went live. According to Dune Analytics, in the first 10 days alone, over 85,000 tokens were issued through the protocol, generating over 3 million US dollars in transaction fees.
However, since early May, all indicators including transaction fees, new runes, and user activity have declined by at least 50%. Since May 1st, only about 5,000 new runes have been created, generating transaction fees of less than 100,000 US dollars.
Source: Dune Analytics
During its peak, Rune-related transactions accounted for 80% of the entire Bitcoin transaction fees, but now it is only 20%.
Source: Dune Analytics
Ho Chan Chung, the marketing director of CryptoQuant, previously stated that the success of Bitcoin Layer 2 projects based on OP_Return is questionable because the UTXO-based blockchain network and the smart contract-based network fundamentally differ. The narrative of Bitcoin as a digital currency and the fundamental differences in its blockchain network are the two major obstacles that Bitcoin Layer 2 projects need to overcome.
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