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I first heard about Shiba Inu this past spring just as “Dogecoin Fever” was beginning to cool off. My immediate feeling after reading about this new coin nicknamed “Dogecoin Killer” was frustration, but I was mostly frustrated with myself.
In the summer of 2018, I had purchased around $20 worth of DOGE, and had around 6,000 coins. But like any new crypto investor I did everything wrong at first. I panicked about losing money, even if it was only $20. I bought and sold at all the wrong times. Somehow I knew after Elon Musk was on SNL that Doge would not rise to the same heights again for quite some time. Not only did I buy in again much too late, when Doge was about 5 cents a coin, but I also waited too long to sell. For some reason all the press surrounding Shiba Inu felt like more nails in the Doge coffin, I guess the nickname is appropriate.
Over the past summer I focused on more appropriate cryptos, ones with real plans, cryptos with purpose. I sought stability and 4% APRs. It wasn’t until about a week ago that I felt something akin to that same fever I felt this past spring. I saw the words “Shiba Inu (SHIB) is now available on Coinbase.” I clicked on the banner, checked out the price, and thought, “well here’s my chance to do this over.”
What is Shiba Inu?
I don’t even want to say it, I think we all probably know it, but just in case I will say that Shiba Inu is considered a “meme coin” which is a term that seems pretty cringey. It has gained popularity in a very dramatic and public way. Like Dogecoin, this cryptocurrency pays homage to a Japanese hunting dog. Like Dogecoin, the price of Shiba Inu ebbs and flows depending on what Elon Musk writes on his Twitter account. However, unlike Dogecoin, Shiba Inu’s developers have found ways to create more of a demand for SHIB by doing what is called a “coin burn.” Which according to Nasdaq means “a coin holder transfers a portion of his or her assets to a wallet which nobody can access. In effect, this destroys those coins and thereby reduces the cryptocurrency’s total supply.”
SHIB started with a supply of 1 quadrillion, but its creators sent 50% of the original supply to Vitalik Buterin, who donated some of the SHIB to covid relief, and the rest to a dead wallet, which essentially “burns” that supply. The developers of SHIB have indicated that this could be something of a regular practice, which would help the price of SHIB to continue rising. As of right now, Doge developers do not burn coins, so the supply of Doge is potentially unlimited. This prevents Doge from rising unless there is a lot of momentum, an Elon Musk tweet, or if the price of Bitcoin is surging.
Recently Shiba Inu was added to Coinbase, and according to Coinbase, it runs on the Ethereum network. It’s ecosystem supports projects like an NFT art incubator, and its developers are working on creating a decentralized exchange called Shibaswap. At the time of writing Shiba Inu is #15 in popularity on Coinbase.
Should you buy Shiba Inu?
I’ve read a lot of articles about crypto in the past three years, but most of the things I know about crypto, the important things, I’ve learned from experience. I think the most important thing to know is that crypto is extraordinarily volatile. The highs are awesome, the lows seem to drudge on forever. But every 4 years or so, Bitcoin does halve, and with that halving comes a surge in price for all cryptos. Every crypto I’ve tracked has risen over time, maybe not day to day, but over the course of a year, that crypto averages a higher price. With that being said, there are a lot of external factors that can drag prices down at any time. So I will add this piece of advice that is often tacked on at the end of any financial article “don’t spend money on crypto that you aren’t willing to lose.”
So with all of that in mind, last week I invested under $100 on Shiba Inu, and became a Shiba Inu coin millionaire (which I have to admit gave me some weird confidence for about 24 hours). Will Shiba Inu reach $10? $5? $1? I don’t know. What I do know is if it completely fails I won’t lose more money than it would take to buy a decent dinner, but if it reaches a penny, I’ll have a down payment for a home.
So will Shiba Inu keep rising? Is it a sound investment? No one can honestly say for sure. As we’ve all seen in the past several years, things can completely change very quickly. As for me, I’ll be holding my SHIB.
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