Since Trump's election victory, the cryptocurrency market has been rising for days, with Bitcoin breaking $81,000 repeatedly, and among the top 30 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, the most impressive surge is from the meme coin ancestor Dogecoin ($DOGE).
Dogecoin overtakes USDC to become the 6th largest cryptocurrency
CoinGecko data shows that Dogecoin skyrocketed from less than $0.23 yesterday to approximately $0.30 today, reaching a new high since early November 2021. In the past 24 hours, Dogecoin surged 27.1%, with a market cap exceeding $42.39 billion, surpassing USDC's $36.9 billion market cap, making it the 6th largest cryptocurrency.
The volatility of Dogecoin has also triggered a large amount of liquidation activity in the market, with Coinglass data showing that in the past 24 hours, the liquidation amount for Dogecoin reached $64.3 million, second only to Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Dog-themed meme coins surge
Perhaps influenced by the rise of Dogecoin, other dog-themed meme coins have also performed well, dominating the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market cap in terms of price increase:
Third place WIF: surged 24.1%, with a market cap of $3.11 billion
Fourth place FLOKI: up 22.3%, with a market cap of $1.77 billion
Fifth place Shiba Inu SHIB: surged 18.6%, with a market cap of $15.6 billion, just one step away from the top 10 by market cap
Will Dogecoin replicate the surge of 2021?
Although Dogecoin has surged over 90% in the past week, it is still 60.3% away from its historical high in May 2021. This has raised market attention: will Dogecoin replicate its surge from 2021 in this bull market?
The surge of Dogecoin in those years was closely related to the support of Elon Musk. Musk has publicly expressed his support for Dogecoin multiple times on X, calling it 'the people's cryptocurrency' and referring to himself as the 'father of Dogecoin.'
He frequently tweets about Dogecoin, directly affecting investor sentiment and triggering several price surges. For example, in April 2021, Musk shared a meme image of 'Doge barking at the moon' on Twitter, causing Dogecoin's price to hit an all-time high, exceeding $0.70.
In addition, Musk revealed that Tesla would support Dogecoin payments for specific goods and announced that the supercharging stations it plans to build would also accept Dogecoin payments, sparking market expectations for Dogecoin's use cases, making it familiar even outside the crypto community.
Following Tesla, Musk announced that his aerospace company SpaceX would soon accept Dogecoin payments for certain goods and services, even naming its satellite launch plan 'Doge-1,' which is funded by Dogecoin, further boosting Dogecoin's price and recognition, as well as its potential as a payment method and funding tool.
Since then, Musk has continued to support Dogecoin on X, such as during an X Space in mid-January this year, where he revealed that he still holds a large amount of Dogecoin and has not sold any because Dogecoin is his favorite cryptocurrency.
Musk advocates for the establishment of the Department of Government Efficiency (D.O.G.E)
Before the U.S. presidential election, Musk initiated an initiative called the 'Department of Government Efficiency' (D.O.G.E), aimed at conducting a comprehensive financial audit of the U.S. federal government and suggesting cuts to waste, fraud, and unnecessary spending. The name of this plan coincidentally matches the code of Dogecoin, 'DOGE.'
Subsequently, Trump adopted this idea and announced on September 6 during a speech at the New York Economic Club that if elected, he would establish the Department of Government Efficiency led by Musk. On October 27, Musk took the stage to support Trump, stating that his goal in leading the department is to cut $2 trillion from the federal budget.
The next day, Musk shared a photo on the X platform of himself supporting Trump, wearing a 'Make America Great Again' hat and raising his fist, alongside a similar action by a Shiba Inu image, once again promoting Dogecoin.
Now, with Trump's election victory, the market is full of expectations for the establishment of the 'Department of Government Efficiency' and Musk's renewed promotion of Dogecoin, injecting new political traffic into Dogecoin. The recent rise in Dogecoin may be a response to this background.
Therefore, when considering whether Dogecoin can replicate the trends of 2021, it is worth contemplating whether Musk will truly enter politics and whether the Department of Government Efficiency will be successfully established. If your answers to these questions are affirmative, then Dogecoin is likely to gain significant attention, as the essence of meme coins is attention.
