‘Dogecoin Killer’ Shiba Inu Adds $11B To Ethereum Founder Vitalik Buterin’s Net Worth

Dogecoin knockoff Shiba Inu (SHIB) saw a price rise of over 1647.42% in the past week.

What Happened: At press time, SHIB was trading even higher at $0.00002948, gaining over 50% moments after Binance announced it would list the token.

SHIB’s price surge has added over $11 billion to the net worth of Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) founder Vitalik Buterin, who holds over 505 billion SHIB tokens representing 50% of its total supply.

Why It Matters: The entirety of Buterin’s holdings were not actually the result of him purchasing the coins but rather a “give away” of sorts from Shiba Inu’s creators.

According to Shiba Inu’s white paper, sending 50% of the token’s supply to Buterin was done to remove them from circulation and create an element of scarcity for the tokens.

“We sent over 50% of the TOTAL supply to Vitalik. There is no greatness without a vulnerable point and as long as VB doesn’t rug us, then SHIBA will grow and survive,” said the SHIB founder.

See also: Ethereum Creator Vitalik Buterin Becomes A Billionaire As ETH Hits Another All-Time High Of $3,200

Vitalik cashing out on his SHIB holdings seems to be an unlikely event. As crypto community WarOnRugs puts it, “There’s no incentive for him to tarnish his reputation for 200 ETH.”

👉 To be perfectly clear, Vitalik can rug you. Will he do it? Certainly not. There’s no incentive for him to tarnish his reputation for 200 ETH.

— #WARONRUGS❌ (@WARONRUGS) January 30, 2021

What Else: Shiba Inu founders were inspired to create the Shiba Inu cryptocurrency after 2021 “opened their eyes” as stocks like GameStop Corp. (NYSE:GME) and AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc. (NYSE:AMC) exploded in value overnight.

“WallStreetBets tested the waters of what it would look like to disperse control to consumers and inexperienced investors alike,” they said.