Elon Musk and Dogecoin 'Lion King' Meme Gone Viral. Source: Twitter
Twitter’s main logo abruptly changed on Monday into a picture of the infamous “Doge” meme – a Dogecoin (DOGE) predictably pumped as a result.
The cryptocurrency is up 25% in the past hour, now trading for $0.1.
When logging into Twitter, the bluebird that once appeared on Twitter’s loading page has now been replaced by an icon of Doge. Meanwhile, the similar icon used to return to one’s homepage Twitter feed in the upper left corner of the desktop browser has also been replaced by the notorious dog meme.
The login page is different too, with a massive picture of Doge now covering the blue bird that used to appear when creating an account.
Dogecoin traded for just $0.076 at 13:05 UST on Monday, before skyrocketing after Twitter’s sudden change. On Monday, Musk simply followed the change to Twitter’s logo by publishing a meme:
Elon Musk, who became CEO of Twitter last year, is a longtime Dogecoin fan, and was primarily responsible for briefly bringing the asset into crypto’s top 3 coins in 2021 through a series of bullish tweets.
The billionaire has since exhibited a strong ability to affect Dogecoin’s price, briefly pumping the coin whenever he gives it his occasional good word. For example, the meme coin soared 15% in May of last year after he confirmed that SpaceX would soon start accepting DOGE for merchandise payments.
Naturally, experienced traders were prepared to capitalize on the executive’s latest doge-related activity. Popular crypto trader Kaleo on Twitter said he’d taken some profit after the latest pump and intends to rotate back into Dogecoin if there’s a “decent pullback.”
Not everyone is pleased with Musk’s promotion of Dogecoin, however. Avid Bitcoiners in particular see his latest promotion of the meme as a “distraction” from the various financial benefits that Bitcoin provides.
“For someone at the very top of the 0.1% who benefited the most from our broken money system, instead of standing behind the principles of #Bitcoin, the people’s money – he promotes degenerate get-rich-quick crap,” tweeted @bradmillscan on Monday.
While not opposed to Bitcoin and crypto broadly, the executive has often joined Dogecoin creator Billy Markus in taking a lighthearted approach to the space. In December 2021, he agreed with Markus that Bitcoin likely doesn’t have the power to transform the financial system in the way that bulls believe, saying that’s why he’s “pro-Doge.”
Musk has even claimed that Dogecoin is better for daily transactions than Bitcoin due to its faster base-layer transaction throughput.