Meme coin Shiba Inu gained over 320% in the last 7 days, pushing its market capitalization to approximately $12.5 billion, making it the #15 most valuable cryptocurrency according to coinmarketcap.
This move was fuelled by Tesla and SpaceX boss, Elon Musk, who tweeted a picture of his pet dog with the caption “Floki Frunkpuppy.” In June, the world’s richest man stated, “My Shiba Inu will be named Floki” and last month he tweeted the arrival of his new pet stating, “Floki has arrived.”
Shiba Inu isn’t the only meme coin to rally this week as many other meme coins have followed the same trend, especially those named after Elon Musk’s dog, Floki. Data from coinmarketcap reveals the following meme coins have been having significant rallies all in the last 7 days; ELON is up over 200%, HOGE is up over 58%, SAMO is up over 100%, SMI is up over 300%, AKITA is up over 280% and FLOKIN (named after Elon’s dog) is up over 1,400%.
Backstory
Shiba Inu was founded by an anonymous person going by the name Ryoshi last year and the coin’s website explains that the coin is “a decentralized meme token that evolved into a vibrant ecosystem.” It appears to have been made as a joke just like the famous Dogecoin, a cryptocurrency that was created as a joke in 2013, also with a Shiba Inu meme.
Although made as a joke, these meme coins have been able to attract the attention of Elon Musk, who has stated that he would put a physical Dogecoin on the moon and has also mentioned that Dogecoin will trade as high as $1. The popularity does not end there as the popular meme coin is now used for payments by some sports teams, AMC theatres and others.
Bottomline
Shiba Inu’s current market capitalization represents 24.13% of the total market capitalization of the Nigerian Stock Exchange. It also makes it more valuable than all the tier-1 banks listed on the Nigerian stock exchange combined. Asides from this, Shiba Inu’s market capitalization makes it more valuable than other well-known cryptocurrencies like Litecoin, Chainlink and Bitcoin Cash. The Shiba Inu token is on its way to becoming more valuable than Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote.
Although there is a rally in the meme coin industry, investors are advised to invest with extreme caution as these coins are very volatile and could result in the total loss of an investors portfolio. Shiba Inu is trading $0.00003095 up 36% for the day.
