The frenzy has propelled SHIB to the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market cap — with the memecoin managing to overtake the likes of Litecoin, Chainlink and Bitcoin Cash in the rankings.
It started like it always does — with a tweet from Elon Musk.
Tesla’s CEO shared a picture of Floki, his shiba inu puppy, casually chilling in one of the electric vehicles that made him a billionaire.
Floki Frunkpuppy pic.twitter.com/xAr8T0Jfdf— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 4, 2021
Inevitably, a frenzy in the altcoin markets soon followed. But this time, it wasn’t Bitcoin and Dogecoin that were the main beneficiaries of Musk’s cute content.
Instead, it was SHIBA INU — known as SHIB for short.
The memecoin, which started life as a knock-off alternative to DOGE, has had an extraordinary week. CoinMarketCap data shows SHIB has surged by 348% over the past seven days.
All this activity has propelled SHIB into the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market cap. At one point, its overall valuation meant it was bigger than the likes of Litecoin, Chainlink and Bitcoin Cash, too.
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A Bittersweet Surge
As noted in a recent technical analysis article, SHIB began life with a total supply of one quadrillion tokens. After launch, half of these tokens were locked in Uniswap, and the rest were gifted to Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.
By sending this crypto stash to supply, SHIB’s founders hoped that the tokens would remain untouched. But Buterin, who isn’t all that keen on projects sending random altcoins to his wallets, surprised many by subsequently donating this SHIB to a fund tackling the coronavirus crisis in India back in May.
This was a big deal — as at the time, Buterin’s 50 trillion SHIB was worth a cool $1 billion.
By the end of July, those running the crypto-driven COVID relief fund said just $20 million of these tokens had actually been cashed out and distributed to those who needed it most.
There were two challenges: A lack of liquidity in SHIB markets, and making sure that these tokens could be sold without tanking the price. (This has become less of an issue since the altcoin was listed on Coinbase.)
Alas, SHIB’s value ended up falling 50% when the summer came, meaning that the total cash value of the tokens donated was written down to $400 million.
But here’s the question… how has the latest rally affected the value of this donation.
Well, based on the current price of $0.00003216, these 50 trillion SHIB tokens would now be worth a jaw-dropping $1.6 billion — 60% more than when they were first gifted by Buterin.
Here’s hoping that India’s Crypto COVID Relief Fund still has some SHIB left on its books.
