A $1 Billion Crypto Donation To India Covid Relief In Memecoins Explained

Vitalik Buterin, one of the creators of the cryptocurrency Ethereum, donated more than 50 trillion -- yes, with a T -- Shiba Inu coins, a meta joke about the joke that is Dogecoin.

A memecoin invaded the world of philanthropy this week, bringing with it extreme price volatility and bewildering questions about whether $1 billion worth of a joke cryptocurrency can hold its value. Sandeep Nailwal, a cryptocurrency entrepreneur from New Delhi, set up the India Covid Crypto Relief Fund about three weeks ago after witnessing firsthand deaths caused by a lack of oxygen at the hospitals he volunteered in, as the country battled a devastating health crisis. At first, donations came trickling in, raising roughly $7.5 million up until the middle of this week. That's when Vitalik Buterin, one of the creators of the cryptocurrency Ethereum, donated more than 50 trillion -- yes, with a T -- Shiba Inu coins, a meta joke about the joke that is Dogecoin. It has rallied more than 11,000% in the past month, and based on prices late Monday, 50 trillion of it would have been worth almost $2 billion. But Buterin's donation -- which represented more than 5% of the total Shiba Inu coins in circulation -- sent prices plummeting about 50% by Thursday, leaving people who had bought into it scrambling to figure out whether to sell or hold on. It's also sparked a broader question about the value of such memecoins and whether donating cryptocurrency to charity is more trouble than it's worth for recipients who might need immediate liquidity.