Shiba Inu Weathers Crypto Sell-off Relatively Better, Becomes The First Memecoin To List In South Korea

Cryptocurrencies are sinking along with the rest of the financial markets on Friday amid concerns over a new variant of the COVID-19 virus that is threatening to derail the post-pandemic recovery. Meme crypto Shiba Inu SHIB/USD, however, is faring relatively better.

What Happened: Shiba Inu was seen only modestly lower Friday, while Bitcoin BTC/USD, the mother of all cryptos, and Dogecoin DOGE/USD, a sibling meme currency, were trading with steeper declines.

Shiba Inu, an Ethereum ETH/USD-based altcoin, has the namesake Japanese breed of hunting dog as its mascot. It was created as an alternative to the more popular memecoin, Dogecoin, and was released in August 2020 by an anonymous individual or group called Ryoshi.

Along the way, the meme token has built up a frenzied following, which backs the crypto to the hilt.

After starting the year almost no value, Shina Inu saw muted trading and price action until October 2021. Come October, Shiba Inu took off to the moon, rising from $0.000007 on Sept. 30 to an all-time high of $0.000078 intraday on Oct. 30. Since then, the crypto has come off that level.

Much of the impetus came from an endorsement by Tesla Inc TSLA CEO Elon Musk, its listing in multiple top-tier exchanges such as Coinbase Global Inc COIN, Binance and Kraken, and wider acceptance as payment options by merchants.

At one point in October, Shiba Inu's market capitalization surpassed that of Dogecoin before falling back.

Related Link: Clamor For Adding Shiba Inu To Robinhood Grows Louder As The Meme Crypto Shoots For The Moon

Shiba Inu Leaves Doge Behind Enroute to South Korea: Shiba Inu began trading on Krobit, South Korea's first virtual currency exchange on Wednesday, earning the distinction of being the first meme currency to be listed in the country.

"We support Shibainu (SHIB) and Injective Protocol (INJ) transactions," the exchange announced earlier this week. Wallet creation and deposit started being available Wednesday and transaction and withdrawal on Thursday.

This was followed by an airdrop where the first 100 customers received 360,000 SHIB for creating and depositing Shiba Inu on the exchange.

The development is considered an accomplishment, given South Korea has some of the most stringent laws surrounding cryptocurrencies.

SHIB Price Action: Shiba Inu was trading down 5.36% at $0.0000381 Friday morning.

Related Link: Is Shiba Inu (SHIB) A Good Investment

Photo: Ferhat Deniz Fors via Unsplash