- It’s taken 14 months for the meme coin Shiba Inu to enter the ranks of the world’s top 20 cryptos.
- Its market value hit $12 billion on Thursday. Dogecoin took six times as long to hit the mark.
- Elon Musk’s tweet with a photo of his Shiba Inu on Monday appeared to trigger a rally in the coin.
Move over, dogecoin. A spin-off, Shiba Inu, is on a tear, having gained about 350% in a month – roughly what bitcoin has gained in a year.
The price of the dogecoin-inspired cryptocurrency has risen by over 300% in a week, pushing it into the top 20 coins by market capitalization, with a value of $12 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.
Read: Shib Becomes Most-Traded Crypto on Coinbase
It’s done this in the 14 months since its inception, in August 2020. It took dogecoin six times as long – 88 months from its launch – to reach that size.
The most recent catalyst for Shiba Inu fever appeared to be the Tesla CEO and crypto enthusiast Elon Musk’s tweet on Monday with a photo of his real-life Shiba Inu puppy and the caption “Floki Frunkpuppy.”
Since then, the coin, created by someone with the pseudonym Ryoshi, soared from $0.00001348 to about $0.00003068 on Thursday, up another 41% over the 24 hours to 6:32 a.m. ET.
Read: Crypto Whales Purchasing Large Amounts Of Shiba Inu
Crypto bulls piled in again this week after a few weeks of volatility and pullbacks. Bitcoin, the No. 1 coin, reached a market cap of $1 trillion for the first time since May. Shiba inu now ranks above polygon, stellar, and the gaming token axie infinity, which has almost doubled in value in a month.
Read: Shiba Inu Futures Trading Volume Up 78x in Seven Days
But not all market watchers believe the surge in Shiba Inu was solely because of Musk’s tweet.
“There’s no evidence that the tweet explicitly showed support of the SHIB token the same way he did in the past by posting memes for dogecoin,” Eliézer Ndinga, a research lead at 21Shares, said.
Disclaimer: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic’s opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.
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