A cryptocurrency has already been created under the name of Leo XIV

What is impressive is the timing. Only a few minutes after the election of the new Pope, Leo XIV, the first memes began to appear on social media with what is effectively the first memecoin inspired by the new pontiff. $LeoXiv. It was to be expected. The memecoin – a cryptocurrency based on memes, a popular, viral phenomenon – quickly began to circulate on platforms such as X (formerly Twitter), Reddit and Telegram.

What is a memecoin?

Memecoins are cryptocurrencies whose value is not tied to a concrete technological project or real-world use, but to their ability to generate attention, irony and virality. The first, perhaps the best known, is Dogecoin, born in 2013 as a parody of Bitcoin, but over time it has become one of the most capitalized cryptocurrencies, also thanks to the endorsement of figures such as Elon Musk who took the name of his department to cut US public spending from that meme.

Compared to Ethereum or Solana, memecoins do not propose an infrastructure, a network or a purpose of use that is in any way innovative. Their value comes almost exclusively from the community that is created around them and from the speed with which they manage to establish themselves as cultural phenomena. They are often linked to a fact that creates a lot of public attention: Donald Trump had his memecoin, his wife Melania too, now even the Pope, although without his knowledge.

Why $LEOXIV then?

$LEOXIV is a pretty clear example of how digital culture observes, exploits and reshapes global events. The papal election, an event loaded with symbolism and media attention, immediately became a tempting opportunity to launch a new token.

As irreverent, even disturbing as it may seem to link the name of a pope to a cryptocurrency, the role played by the election of a pope, with its load of attention that involved the entire international community, was a perfect opportunity. Everything that is discussed, popular, visible, can be the object of tokenization . And while the Vatican faced the world with a new pontiff, a part of the internet responded with $LEOXIV.

A meme, like LEOXIV, is a very high-risk asset. At the moment, the one linked to the new pontiff has a market capitalization of about 60 thousand dollars, but it has already had significant fluctuations in just a few hours. Its volatility is extreme, its utility is almost nil, and there is no guarantee of continuity. It is important to underline that most memecoins vanish after a few weeks or months, leaving behind a trail of users who have invested solely on the basis of the attention and echo generated in the short term.