Shiba Inu that sparked Solana memecoin mania earns owners $4.3m in Ethereum

Minted on March 15 with a listing price of just five Ether, the original picture that sparked the dogwifhat meme has just made its owners millionaires.

Crypto trader GCR won the day’s auction, splurging 1,210 Ether, roughly $4.3 million, to buy the picture that spawned the eponymous Solana memecoin.

GCR acquired the non-fungible token via an auction on the NFT marketplace Foundation. He beat competition from notable bidders, such as NFT collector PleasrDAO and crypto venture capital outfit Memeland.

Dubbed “Achi, the dog wif hat,” the NFT is a photograph of a Shiba Inu named Achi wearing a knitted beanie.

The photograph was taken in 2018 by a South Korean Instagram user with the moniker ma_babezz, who has been verified as Achi’s owner and became a viral Internet meme the following year.

It launched as a memecoin on Solana in November and is now the fourth most valuable memecoin in crypto, with a market size of $2.8 billion. Dogecoin is the most valuable of the lot, ahead of Shiba Inu and Pepe. WIF is up 6% at press time.

GCR, who also goes by Gigantic Rebirth, is famous for shorting LUNA for $10 million in May 2022 after a public wager with Terraform Labs CEO Do Kwon that the token would trade lower than $88 by March 2023 — a bet he won.

The Achi NFT auction on Foundation courted significant controversy, especially among the Solana memecoin crowd.

Though Achi was the inspiration for the Solana memecoin, the NFT was minted on Ethereum.

On Instagram, commentators panned Achi’s owners’ decision to partner with Feisty DAO due to the latter’s ties with Ethereum. The DAO helped list the picture on the Foundation marketplace and market the sale.

Feisty DAO is an NFT project known for selling fractionalised Shiba-themed NFTs on Ethereum. Feisty The DAO did not immediately respond to DL News’ request for comments.

Memecoin madness

The Achi NFT auction, which ended with a $4.3 million winning bid, is yet another indication of the popularity of memes in crypto.

Memecoins have amassed a $51 billion market size, according to CoinGecko with newer entrants this cycle, like Pepe and dogwifhat joining mainstays like Dogecoin and Shiba Inu.

Frenzied trading of these memecoins in the last couple of days has catapulted activity on Solana above Ethereum, with Pav Hundal, lead market analyst at crypto exchange Swyftx, telling DL News, “Solana has effectively become the ‘people’s coin.’”

Osato Avan-Nomayo is our Nigeria-based DeFi correspondent. He covers DeFi and tech. To share tips or information about stories, please contact him at osato@dlnews.com.