In a speculative market move, Dogecoin (DOGE) and Floki (FLOKI), two popular dog-themed meme tokens, witnessed a notable uptick, surging up to 12% before experiencing a slight retreat. The catalyst behind this surge was the emergence of an @xpayments profile on the social app X, sparking hopes of increased adoption within the crypto community.
Over the weekend, trading volumes for both DOGE and FLOKI surged by 200%, as per CoinGecko data. This surge occurred despite the broader crypto market experiencing relatively lower trading volumes amid a period of little volatility. Concurrently, futures tracking these tokens saw open interest rise from $200 million to a cumulative $430 million, indicating a growing interest and confidence among traders.
Notably, DOGE has a historical tendency to rally in response to payments-related developments, particularly those involving companies owned by Elon Musk, such as X or Tesla. Meanwhile, Floki, named after Musk’s dog, has become a beta bet for midcap traders.
Speculation within the crypto circles suggests that the surge in DOGE and FLOKI is linked to the possibility of advertisers being able to use DOGE for various transactions, including payments for ads on platforms like Twitter. Simon Schaber, CBDO of Spool DAO, highlighted the parallels between this speculation and past occurrences when Tesla announced the acceptance of DOGE for goods.
Schaber explained in a Telegram message last July, “The speculation is that advertisers could be able to pay DOGE for ads and for other uses on Twitter. We have seen the same happening when Tesla revealed the ability to pay for its goods with DOGE. So the speculation could be around Musk’s businesses and stakeholdings starting to accept crypto, as Tesla does.”
The @xpayments account, set up late on a Friday, has already amassed over 100,000 followers. Earlier this year, X announced in a blog post its plans to introduce peer-to-peer payment capabilities on the application, with Musk hinting at the potential inclusion of cryptocurrencies.