After Brad Sherman mentioned "Mongoose Coin" in Congress, a cryptocurrency that didn't exist. Now, it's been created — and it already has a market cap of $25 million.
A crypto-skeptic congressman had raised eyebrows with his contribution to a congressional hearing attended by six executives from the industry.
Brad Sherman — who back in 2019 said that Facebook's plans to launch a digital currency could do more harm to America than 9/11 — told them:
"The number one threat to cryptocurrency is crypto. Bitcoin could be displaced by Ether, which could be displaced by DOGE, which could be displaced by HamsterCoin. And there's CobraCoin, what could MongooseCoin do to CryptoCoin?"
Sherman's remarks amounted to word salad — not least because half of these coins didn't even exist. The footage caused plenty of amusement on Crypto Twitter.
And now, barely a day later, the crypto world has reacted in the most predictable name imaginable… by launching tokens inspired by the fictitious ones he concocted.
Mongoose Coin — not to mention Mong Coin and Goose Coin — have now popped up, with some attracting thousands of Twitter followers.
A Twitter account that claims to be linked to Mongoose Coin claims it has already attracted a market cap of $25 million, adding:
"This is your Mongress. We're just getting started. You can't stop the $mong movement."
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My Brain Hurts
Of course, the crypto industry has a proud tradition of joke cryptocurrencies gaining momentum. Dogecoin kicked off this trend in 2013 and intended to poke fun at Bitcoin — but no one was laughing after the altcoin surged, with its market cap rising above the valuations of long-established banks.
SHIBA INU subsequently positioned itself as a "Dogecoin killer" — and it too experienced a dizzying surge this year.
But in a way, the sudden creation of Mongoose Coin painfully proves the point that crypto critics are trying to make: it's all too easy to create new tokens with little value that grab the attention of investors.
Sherman believes that many of these memecoins are driven by greed — and warned this "self-mocking" humor can do more harm than good, telling Bloomberg:
"How can you pay anything for a Hamster Coin, if a joke made by a bald congressman from LA at a hearing is gonna rip your Hamster Coin with its Mongoose teeth?"
