Elon Musk.
Andrew Kelly/Reuters
- Elon Musk said he would keep supporting Dogecoin, sending its price up by nearly 10%.
- Like many cryptocurrencies the coin has lost most of its value this year following a huge selloff.
- Bitcoin and Ethereum remained volatile after big losses on Saturday.
Dogecoin jumped nearly 10% off near-record lows on Sunday after Elon Musk said he would continue to buy the cryptocurrency.
The coin rose about 8.5% in the space of 24 hours after Musk tweeted: “I will keep supporting Dogecoin.”
In response to another user telling Musk to “keep buying it then,” he replied: “I am.”
Musk’s tweets caused the cryptocurrency to spike nearly 10% in the space of an hour to $0.056, helping to compensate for heavy declines over the past month.
—Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 19, 2022
It has aligned with a rebound in other cryptocurrencies as they struggle following significant losses.
After a record 12-day losing streak, Bitcoin was trading at about $18,300 on Sunday after sliding under $20,000 on Saturday, according to CoinDesk. It had been as low as $17,600.
Ethereum fell as low as $880 before rising to trade at about $965, according to CoinDesk.
The rises represent a fraction of the losses given up by cryptos this year, with Bitcoin down 70% and Ethereum down about three quarters this year. Dogecoin is down by two thirds.
Dogecoin was started by its creators as a joke, but has gained fans since Musk began to champion the coin in 2019.
The makers of Dogecoin told Decrypt last year they were working with Musk to make the coin a cheaper, greener alternative to bitcoin.
Its price has never recovered from a Saturday Night Live appearance in May 2021 where Musk jokingly labelled the coin a “hustle,” sending it from record highs of $0.72 to $0.33 in a week. The currency also rallied after news first broke of Musk’s plan to buy Twitter in a $44 billion deal.
Musk was this week sued for nearly $260 billion by a Dogecoin investor for allegedly running a “pyramid scheme”, by pretending the coin has any sort of value to drive up its price.
