The popular memecoin Pepe surged by 118% over the past two days, reaching a 10-month high on Feb. 27.

As of press time, the memecoin was trading at $0.0000026, marking a 58% increase over 24 hours. It reached a high of $0.0000029 before experiencing a slight decline over the last two hours, according to CryptoSlate data.

Pepe currently boasts a market cap exceeding $1 billion, with a 24-hour trading volume of $1.38 billion — a staggering 480% increase over the past day.

Memecoins have emerged as one of the top sectors on CryptoSlate today, showing gains of 11.8% in 24 hours and 16.91% in weekly gains.

The rally led to almost $4.4 million in shorts being liquidated over the past 24 hours, as per Coinglass data.

Pepe Coin's surge to a 10-month high was fueled by the overall recovery momentum of the crypto market over the past two days. Several digital assets experienced significant uplift as Bitcoin reclaimed price levels last seen in 2021.

Pepe's OI-Weighted Funding Rate witnessed a notable increase, rising from 0.0169% to 0.12%, indicating bullish sentiment among traders. However, the funding rate has since retreated to 0.06% amid the retracement. Nevertheless, the increase suggests a growing willingness to pay more for holding long positions, with expectations of higher future prices.

Bitcoin's recent rally has benefited Pepe and spurred increased interest and investment in other memecoins, signaling a renewed enthusiasm for these niche digital assets.

In the memecoin frenzy, popular memecoin Floki Inu (FLOKI) and recently launched Dogwifhat (WIF) saw gains of over 30% over the past 24 hours, with the latter surging by almost 60% before a retracement.

GROK and LADYS also recorded gains of 22% and 19.9% over the past day, respectively, while other small-cap memecoins like Akita Inu and SNEK posted similar gains.

Additionally, the original memecoin DOGE saw an increase of roughly 12% over the same period, while SHIB and BONK followed closely behind with approximately 10% rises.

Google trends data indicates a resurgence in retail interest in crypto, with crypto-related searches up more than 200% across the board.

This renewed interest is bolstered by the introduction of institutional money in the industry through the recent launch of spot Bitcoin ETFs by traditional finance giants like BlackRock. The record-breaking performance of the Newborn Nine ETFs is prompting investment managers to reconsider their stance toward crypto.