A joke that’s worth US$50 billion and more

I will be honest, the first time I heard about Bitcoin I was not convinced of its universal value. It seemed more like an anarchist’s version of what money ought to be, something right up Richard Stallman’s alley. To be fair traditional fiat money doesn’t make much sense either.

Turns out I am not the only one who thought Bitcoin didn’t make sense the first time they heard of it. Two software engineers also thought cryptocurrency was a whole lot of nothing. To prove their point they embarked on a journey to create a satirical currency called Dogecoin. They really went out of their way to make it as ridiculous as possible.

Everything about Dogecoin screams this is a joke and we are not taking things seriously. Starting from the name which is an obvious misspelling, then there is the mascot/official face of the altcoin: a Shiba Inus inspired by a popular meme that was doing rounds during those days. Updated versions of the meme are still popular to this day. Unlike Bitcoin, Dogecoin doesn’t come with a limited supply, those coins will keep increasing in number.

Not laughing anymore

While it might have started as a joke, Dogecoin is now a joke that is worth well over US$50 billion in market capitalisation terms. In other words, if we multiply the number of Dogecoins currently available by the current market value, we get US$50 billion. The meme-inspired altcoin has been boosted by the recent listing of Coinbase a cryptocurrency processing company onto the New York Stock Exchange.

It’s more than that though it seems, that DogeCoin also benefited from the Elon Musk publicity it received in January as well after the controversial billionaire tweeted about it. Other public figures have also talked about it making it even more popular and piquing the interest of amateurs and speculative investors.

There is also the expert fatigue that is plaguing the world right now. It seems people are just now tired of listening to experts and expert advice-it could be listening to all those COVID-19 briefs is making people mad. Anyway, the incessant rise in the value of Dogecoin has irked wealth and investment experts who have loudly proclaimed their disdain for the cryptocurrency. Much to their chagrin, it seems this advice is actually driving people to do the opposite.

While every banking expert and investment journal is calling for caution people are flocking to the coin. Its price rose to US$0.35 on Tuesday, the highest ever, before it went up to US$0.42. People are corralling and cajoling each other on amateur investment platforms in a bid to keep pushing the prices.

This will not end well

Experts are right about one thing. The price of cryptocurrency it’s so volatile investing in something like Dogecoin is not something you want to seriously do. Investing your life’s savings into Dogecoin is not something you want to ever do but if you have US$10 lying around somewhere it could be a fun joke that might end up paying you well- or not. Never invest more than you can afford to lose.

Already it seems the bubble has burst, at the time of writing this the price of DogeCoin has fallen by 20% although it might just rally back up again. Sometimes there is really no plain logic to the price of cryptocurrencies and DogeCoin is just as bad as the others when it comes to volatily.

One thing to note about Dogecoin is that it is as much a joke today as it was the day it was created back during the first week of December 2013. But it is a very valuable joke that could be fun to invest a couple of dollars in if you want to play around with cryptocurrency. Just don’t let yourself become the butt of the joke by taking it too seriously.

Case in point one investor invested in Dogecoin because he missed his Shiba Inus which had just died. He actually made a tidy profit from it. Maybe his Shiba is looking out for him from beyond the grave. That’s the Dogecoin spirit.