Elon Musk declared his love for Dogecoin a few years ago — his first post on the subject dates back to 2019, when he called it his “favorite cryptocurrency” — and since then, he’s been sending cryptocurrencies on a roller coaster ride after each one. One of his many posts on this topic. Earlier this month, in a significant step and additional stamp of approval for cryptocurrencies, Tesla updated its payment methods to accept DOGE, according to its website.
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This caused the price of DOGE to rise, according to CoinGecko. As of May 10, the price is up 3.5% in the past week, and a whopping 94.1% in the past year, according to CoinGecko data.
However, DOGE’s path is difficult, as many altcoins and memecoins are very volatile in nature. While Musk still has a significant influence on DOGE’s popularity and price, it remains to be seen whether its trajectory correlates with his.
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It is difficult to predict the value of DOGE in five years
Patrick Gruen—lawyer, entrepreneur, CEO of PMX Technologies, and former (now defunct) FTX CEO—argued that there’s no way to really predict the value of DOGE years from now, especially with “the sheer hype around memecoins on Solana as well.”
However, Gruen pointed out that there is a very interesting point regarding memecoins in general, as they are often seen as a form of protest.
“The argument goes like this: If the government were going to inflate and tax my hard-earned money, to pay off their debts, enrich their friends, and buy political votes to re-elect me, then I would simply be using the method of a completely different monetary system that they couldn’t mint. It would be a dog on the face of the coin, Because that’s what I think is currently represented by the faces currently on our physical coins.
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“Since Elon is creating an entire ecosystem of software and hardware innovation, perhaps he can stand by this protest and allow Dogecoin to be used with his products/services, thus ensuring demand for it. Then, of course, the value in five years could be significant,” he added.
Other experts weigh in
While other experts agreed with the hypothesis that the price of meme coins is difficult to predict due to their volatility, one thing is certain.
“Memecoins are here to stay – at least for now,” said Jeff Owens, co-founder of Haven1.
Owens noted that despite the lack of underlying technology or concrete use case, the memecoin craze over the past few months highlights that these assets have some value — value that is mostly based on market sentiment.
Furthermore, institutional adoption of memecoins and their entry into the broader financial landscape, such as Tesla’s move, will push the hype even further.
However, he also stressed that these early adoption steps did not prevent the volatility of the memecoin.
“By nature, it is a much more volatile investment than other leading cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin or Ethereum,” he said. “So, this is something to consider when investing in Dogecoin, or any other meme-themed coin over the next five years.”
DOGE also faces significant competition in the memcoin space, where tokens like Pepe, Shiba Inu, Bonk and countless others have taken market share, said Coin Bureau editor-in-chief Tyler McCracken.
He said Memecoin investors are quick to jump on the latest trends in search of the “next DOGE,” which could further dampen Dogecoin’s performance.
What about Musk’s continued influence on Dougie? Is the Doji path related to Musk?
As Rebecca Liao, CEO of Saga, points out: “Attention is an incredible asset in the increasingly digital economy in which the world operates.”
“We are still in the early stages of this trend, and I must caution that most meme coins will not be worth much in the long term,” she said. “But in order to bind digital communities together, memes have a lot of appeal and influence. The fact that many of them are funny and silly adds to that appeal, as Elon Musk has clearly demonstrated with his affinity for Dogecoin.”
As for Musk’s continued influence on cryptocurrencies, Coin Bureau’s McCracken called it “the elephant in the room.”
According to him, while many consider Elon to be Doge’s spokesperson, there is a risk that he might get bored with the coin and move on to something else.
“There is a significant risk of ‘key man’ when the price of a cryptocurrency is strongly influenced by the adoption and motivations of a single individual,” he said.
He noted that when Musk was asked why he loved DOGE so much, he cited humorous reasons for making fun of him.
“Elon is in a unique position to integrate Doge into multiple different aspects of society as a means of payment,” he added. “Depending on Elon’s actions and vision for things like sending Doge to the moon (literally) and Doge accepting Tesla products – with Elon’s support, Dogecoin will likely remain priced and perform strongly in the cryptocurrency industry.”
Even if Musk is removed from that position, DOGE will likely remain relevant, although at a more subdued pace, McCracken added.
“It has become a true bastion of the memecoin community and with Memecoins being among the best-performing projects of all time, even without Elon’s upgrade, Dogecoin is likely to continue its potential in the long term,” he added.
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: If you owned Elon Musk’s favorite cryptocurrency, Dogecoin, what would it be worth in 5 years?