Is Vitalik Buterin In The Dogehouse? Ethereum Co-Founder's Charitable Donation Causes Drop In Shiba Inu, Other Coins

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has been a well-known name in the cryptocurrency industry. The popular figurehead of Ethereum is also well-loved by creators of meme coins, which has resulted in the gifting of coins to Buterin, which may have backfired Wednesday.

What Happened: Meme coins that were inspired by Dogecoin DOGE/USD saw their valuations fall Wednesday as it was revealed that Buterin regifted tokens that were donated to him.

CoinDesk reports that tokens regifted by Buterin include Shiba Inu SHIB/USD, Dogelon ELON/USD, Akita Inu AKITA/USD, mwDOGE (CRYPTO: mwDOGE) and OURSHIB OSHIB/USD.

The most notable transaction was 50 trillion Shiba Inu tokens, worth around $1.2 billion, donated by Buterin to the India Covid Relief Fund. Buterin also sent $431 million worth of Akita Inu tokens to Gitcoin, a public Ethereum-based platform for fundraising.

See also: How to Buy Ethereum (ETH)

Buterin donated over $2 million worth of Ethereum along with the SHIB tokens to the India Covid Relief Fund, DeCrypt reports. The ELON tokens, and additional ETH, was donated to the medical charity Methuselah Foundation.

Another $53 million in Ethereum was donated to GiveWell.

Related Link: Dogecoin Killer Shiba Inu Adds $11B To Ethereum Founder Vitalik Buterin's Net Worth 

Why It’s Important: The developers of SHIB sent over half of the total tokens to Buterin. The move was done as a “burn” to remove them from the market to decrease supply and raising the demand for the token. The move may have backfired with the valuation of SHIB now falling.

Shiba Inu’s white paper called for the sending of 50% of the token’s supply to create an element of scarcity.

“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,” the SHIB founder said.

Price Action: Akita Inu is down 48% at the time of writing.

Shiba Inu is down 37% at the time of writing. Dogelon is down 69% at the time of writing.