Meme and AI token indices plummet 50% from December peaks while US and DeFi indices show resilience

Various sectors of the crypto market, based on the GMCI indices, have fully retraced their post-U.S. election gains, as the market displayed its bearish wrath over participants in recent weeks.

Indices such as the GML2, GMMEME, GMDEPIN, GMGM, GMAI, GMSMALL, GMMID, GMSOL and GMSOLMEME were among those that fully returned to their pre-election levels. For example, the  GMMEME  and  GMAI indices are down 60% and 56%, respectively, from their peaks in December 2024, with the remaining previously-mentioned indices experiencing similar drawdowns. 

Meanwhile, some of the best-performing indices, relatively speaking, have been the  GMUSA  and  GMDEFI  indices.

The GMUS index is down just 29% since its peak in January 2025. It represents protocols with a legal entity based in the United States, which includes SOL, XRP, DOGE, ADA, LINK, LTC and XLM, among others. 

The GMDEFI index is down 38% since its peak in December, and while it is a steeper decline compared to the GMUS index, it has fared better than its meme and AI counterparts. The GMDEFI index is composed of LINK, OM, UNI, ONDO, AAVE and MKR, among others.

The outperformance of these indices, relatively, since the U.S. election is not surprising considering how U.S. and DeFi-based protocols are likely to benefit from a pro-crypto government administration.

The  GM30 index , which represents a selection of the top 30 cryptocurrencies, has also performed relatively well, with it down just -24% from its peak in December.

Though the majority of this “outperformance” can be attributed to just BTC, XRP and BNB, which have maintained roughly the same price levels they had since December, with all the other coins in this list performing poorly since. This is another evidence of the altcoin annihilation seen in the market over the past several months, with TOTAL2 down 28% since its peak in early December 2024, while BTC is down just 6% since the time of TOTAL2’s peak, with BTC.D up 13% since.

This is an excerpt from  The Block's Data & Insights newsletter . Dig into the numbers making up the industry's most thought-provoking trends.