Shiba Inu, a meme coin, has seen big gains in the past week, with its price surging 26.4% over the past week, according to CoinGecko data. It’s up 2.4% in the past 24 hours.
One of the reasons for the surge could be that traders are anticipating the launch of an upcoming Ethereum-based blockchain called “Shibarium,” which developers announced on Jan. 15.
Other dog-related coins have also seen their price go up. Dogecoin, the original Shiba Inu-themed coin, is up 3.6% in the past week, and up 10.7% in the past 14 days, per CoinGecko data. BONK, which saw its price surge 3,174% in the beginning of January, is up 18.5% in the past 7 days.
In December, Santiment, a blockchain analytics firm, wrote that Dogecoin serves as a contrarian indicator to the market. “Dogecoin rises have foreshadowed bitcoin & crypto drops over the past year,” the firm wrote.
Meanwhile, bitcoin
BTCUSD,
is up 16% in the past week.