Dogecoin Rises 101 Percent After Musk’s Acquisition of Twitter

As Elon Musk took over Twitter, the most popular meme cryptocurrency dogecoin experienced a massive surge.

Doge saw a boom after the social media giant was purchased by the richest man in the world, briefly doubling its value to 14 cents earlier last week. It is now worth just over 12 cents at the time of writing, representing a 101 percent increase over a 7-day period, according to CoinGecko.

The billionaire’s outsized influence on dogecoin is nothing new, but this week’s price has not been seen since May. Musk has not mentioned doge since the completion of the $44 billion Twitter acquisition, but he has responded to tweets from Billy Markus, one of the developers behind Dogecoin, multiple times.

Last week, the total value of dogecoin rose from around 8.1 billion dollars to 16.6 billion dollars currently, surpassing cryptocurrencies like Cardano and Solana, according to CoinGecko. Doge is now the eighth largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization.

Dogecoin also recorded significant volume on major crypto exchanges during the past week. With a total of $302 million on Saturday, dogecoin was the third most traded token on Coinbase, accounting for over 14 percent of the total trading volume on the exchange.

On Binance, trading between tether and dogecoin amounted to $1.8 billion in the last 24 hours, making up 10 percent of the total trading volume. Exchanges between dogecoin and Binance USD also surpassed $900 million, representing 5 percent of the total volume on Binance.

Doge is still down 84 percent from its all-time high of 73 cents, set in May 2021 on the day Musk appeared on Saturday Night Live, a late-night television comedy show. The coin plunged 35 percent after Musk’s appearance, where he called dogecoin ‘the currency of the future,’ but also a ‘hustle.’

The rise in dogecoin’s popularity can be partly attributed to Musk’s long-standing relationship with the token, referenced in numerous tweets and adopted as a payment method for some products and services offered by Musk’s companies.

Some Tesla merchandise is available for purchase through the car manufacturer’s website using dogecoin, and The Boring Company accepts the cryptocurrency as a form of payment for using its Las Vegas Loop. In April, Musk also proposed allowing Twitter users to pay for his premium subscription service, Twitter Blue, using dogecoin.

Musk’s fondness for the cryptocurrency dates back to 2019 when he tweeted, ‘Dogecoin might be my favorite cryptocurrency.’ Since then, he has shared memes on the platform he just acquired multiple times.

Not everyone believes Musk acted in good faith when advocating for doge. In June, a $258 billion lawsuit was filed against Musk, SpaceX, and Tesla for allegedly ‘pumping’ the cryptocurrency.

The closing of Musk’s deal has also impacted other dog-themed crypto meme cryptocurrencies like Shiba Inu and Dogechain, which saw increases of 19 and 100 percent, respectively, last week.