Donald Trump is far ahead of Joe Biden - at least in the world of political meme tokens.

As the November U.S. presidential election approaches, the number and value of cryptocurrencies related to former President Trump have risen sharply in recent weeks.Trump and Biden are preparing for the first debate of the 2024 presidential election, which will be held on Thursday.

The so-called "PolitiFi" token is small in scale, with a total market cap of about $1 billion. Most of the tokens are related to Trump, who claims to be a supporter of cryptocurrency, although he has not provided details of his crypto policy.

According to data from the cryptocurrency platform CoinGecko, among the top 10 political meme tokens by market cap, 7 are related to Trump, many of which involve Trump's slogan "Make America Great Again", such as the MAGA and MAGA Hat tokens; in contrast, only one token (Jeo Boden) is related to Biden.

The largest politically related token, MAGA, was launched at the end of August 2023 and traded on exchanges with the code "TRUM". The market cap of the token soared from almost zero at the beginning of the year to $775 million in June this year.

The Jeo Boden token skyrocketed to $648 million shortly after its launch in March this year, and then gradually declined to $87 million.

Forrest Przybysz, a cryptocurrency trader and CEO of Sistine Research, said that meme coins not only have a high degree of speculation, but are also driven by attention cycles.

"The more attention a token can attract and maintain, the higher its price usually is..." he added. "Trump is a magnet for attention. Therefore, he is the ideal subject of meme tokens."

"As the U.S. election approaches, we can expect the prices and speculation of meme tokens based on Trump to rise."

Political tokens account for only a small fraction of the $46 billion market cap for meme tokens. Meme tokens are a highly speculative, volatile, and high-risk cryptocurrency. According to Coingecko's estimate, meme tokens are a niche market for the $2.3 trillion cryptocurrency market itself.

CoinGecko says that 8 of the top 10 political tokens were launched between May and June of this year, and these tokens are usually aimed at taking advantage of the growing interest in political figures before the election.

"Meme coins, like non-fungible tokens, are collector's items. Our idea is to monetize public attention," said Yan Liberman, co-founder of cryptocurrency research firm Delphi Digital.

Trading these tokens is not easy. Meme currencies listed on large centralized exchanges, such as Coinbase or Binance, are rare.

Legality is in doubt.

In national polls, Biden and Trump are neck-and-neck. With five months until the November 5 election, the market is closely watching the two candidates' debate on Thursday.

Traders at the cryptocurrency website Polymarket are betting on a 59% chance of Trump winning the election.

Political tokens rely on the popularity of political figures and attract small investors with ironic or humorous names. "Fun is of course a huge driving force for tokens performing well," said Liberman of Delphi Digital.

Trump has not said he supports any cryptocurrency issued in his name. However, Liberman said Trump's criticism of the Democratic Party's attempts to regulate the cryptocurrency industry raised his popularity in the industry.

Before the U.S. election, the wider cryptocurrency industry is spending millions to support cryptocurrency-friendly candidates. Investors Tyler Winklevoss and Cameron Winklevoss donated $2 million worth of bitcoin to support Trump last week, but reports say the donation has been refunded because it exceeded the maximum amount allowed by U.S. federal law.

Bitfinex's analyst stated: "As for the election results, these tokens have become speculative assets themselves."