The total meme coin sector’s market capitalization increased a fair amount throughout the past week leading up to Elon Musk’s much-anticipated rebranding of Twitter. In the build up, a couple of these community-driven cryptocurrencies, namely Dogecoin (DOGE) and Shiba Inu (SHIB) saw their prices surge. The main driving factor behind these price increases were the rumors that DOGE would be used as a form of payment on Twitter in the near future.
Meanwhile, SHIB also benefited during this period as Musk mentioned the meme coin in one of his tweets. This triggered speculations within the cryptocurrency community. Shortly after Twitter’s rebranding, Jonah Katz, an engineer at Twitter, responded to the rebranding by tweeting that he would still spend six hours a day scrolling through Twitter, even if they rebranded themselves to a donkey.
In reaction to Jonah's tweet, Musk replied with a laughing emoticon, pointing out that Twitter had previously used a Shiba Inu dog as part of their branding without any noticeable impact. Musk clarified that he was not directly referring to the Shiba Inu cryptocurrency asset, but rather to the dog breed, which is famously associated with both Dogecoin and Shiba Inu.
Meme Coin Market Overview
The overall market capitalization for meme coins rose 2.71% over the past 24 hours, according to the cryptocurrency market tracking website CoinMarketCap. As a result, the total stood at approximately $17,529,222,817 at press time. The two largest meme coins, DOGE and SHIB, both printed 24-hour gains during this period as well.
There was, however, a lowered amount of trading activity for meme coins throughout the past 24 hours. At press time, the total daily trading volume for the meme coin sector stood at around $1,673,203,814, which was a 10.64% decrease over the past day of trading.
DOGE was trading at $0.0794 after its price was able to increase 2.94% over the past 24 hours. This positive daily performance had added to the cryptocurrency’s already-positive weekly performance. Subsequently, the meme coin was up more than 15% over the past 7 days. Furthemore, the cryptocurrency’s monthly performance was boosted to +21.10%.
Despite the 24-hour gain, DOGE’s trading volume had fallen slightly during this period. This brought the altcoin’s total trading volume down to $1,292,568,776, which was 10.82% less volume compared to yesterday’s trading session. Nevertheless, DOGE’s trading volume was the 8th highest amount in the market for the past 24 hours.
In related news, the price of DOGE surged when Elon Musk, the world's wealthiest individual, tweeted a promotional post showcasing the social media site's new logo, which was initially designed by a Dogecoin creator. Furthermore, Musk seemingly incorporated the Dogecoin symbol into his Twitter bio.
Speculations have been circulating for a while, suggesting the possibility of integrating DOGE into the social media platform as a means of payment. In January, there were reports of the company actively developing a product that would support cryptocurrency payments.
In addition to this, the cryptocurrency trader and analyst Ali highlighted in a tweet on Monday that DOGE whales have bought around 3 billion DOGE over the past 3 weeks. It is estimated that the total amount of tokens acquired by these whales during this period is valued at $225 million.
The positive market sentiment around DOGE continued its momentum over the past 24 hours. This enabled the meme coin to claim the number 3 position on CoinMarketcap’s trending list. Meanwhile, Ripple (XRP) was ranked at number 1, while Kaspa (KAS) was 1 position below DOGE.
The second biggest meme coin in terms of market capitalization, SHIB, was able to gain 0.15% and was trading at $0.000007822 at press time as a result. Similar to DOGE, SHIB’s positive daily performance had pushed the meme coin’s weekly performance further into the green - taking the weekly gain to 1.25%. The meme coin also found itself on CoinMarketCap’s trending list at press time, and was ranked 12th on the list. This placed it behind Multichain (MULTI) and above Arbitrum (ARB).
In related news, recent market data from IntoTheBlock, indicates that SHIB’s latest price action has resulted in over 20 trillion SHIB tokens reclaiming their "initial" value. The surge in SHIB's worth over the past week has caused these tokens to shift from losses to profits, highlighting the significant scale and impact of the ongoing rally.
Astonishingly, this surge accounts for a substantial 50% of all "profitable" Shiba Inu tokens currently in circulation. As a result, the Shiba Inu community is experiencing increased euphoria and excitement as enthusiasts celebrate their newfound profitability.
The other top 10 meme coins in terms of market capitalization that posted 24-hour gains were FLOKI, Dogelon Mars (ELON), Doge Killer (LEASH) and MonaCoin (MONA). FLOKI saw its price rise by 0.23% - boosting the altcoin’s price to $0.00002201. Despite this, the cryptocurrency’s weekly performance remained in the red at -8.67%.
ELON was trading at $0.0000001564 after its price rose 0.85%. This positive daily performance succeeded in flipping ELON’s weekly performance from negative to positive, as the cryptocurrency was up 0.31% over the past 7 days as well.
Last but not least, LEASH and MONA were changing hands at $418.67 and $0.5149 following their respective 24-hour gains of 0.71% and 7.47%. LEASH’s weekly performance remained in the red zone at -0.29%, however, while MONA’s price was up 16% for the week.
Today’s Fed Meeting
Investors and traders will want to take note of the upcoming Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) press conference later today. During this press conference, the FOMC will announce whether there will be another interest rate hike or not.
In the event of another interest rate hike, cryptocurrency prices across the board may decline as investors may look to decrease their exposure in riskier asset classes, including cryptocurrencies. This will be especially true for meme coins such as DOGE, SHIB and others which are generally regarded as projects with low levels of real-world utility in the cryptocurrency space.
