It is worth noting that the above news has not been published on the SEC website yet. However, the fact that it may be true is evidenced by the fact that already in late January the commission warned against investing in assets that are promoted in social media.
"The SEC’s Office of Investor Education and Advocacy warns investors of the significant risks of short-term investing based on social media, especially in volatile markets, and provides tips for long-term investing.
Retail investors may seek to profit from volatile markets by buying individual stock, including stock in heavily-promoted companies with smaller market capitalizations. Some of these stocks may be discussed in social media, news aggregators, investment research websites, online investment newsletters, ratings websites, message boards, chat rooms, and discussion forums. It can be tempting to jump on the bandwagon and follow whatever the crowd seems to be doing. Sometimes, however, following the crowd may lead to significant investment losses."
The article above did not explicitly write about Musk, but it is known that he has been promoting DOGE for a long time in a more or less veiled way. He repeated that it is the cryptocurrency of the people. Another time he joked that he would like to be the CEO of this project. He once made a puzzling comment about Bitcoin. He claimed that the word "Bitcoin" is his safe word, a catchphrase he uses when he is daring in the bedroom. He recently added the name of the first cryptocurrency to his Twitter description, which led to a temporary spike in its price.
But will the SEC now actually launch an investigation into Musk's alleged market manipulation?
This year has already shown the big shots on Wall Street that the so-called street can play on their noses. This was evident during the events surrounding the GameStop shares. These were strongly "pumped up" thanks to a joint initiative of minnows from an Internet forum. Then the phenomenon took place on the silver market.
In the case of Musk, however, we are talking about something else. It turns out that one man has so much influence over the markets that he is able to manipulate them using Twitter.
Can Elon Musk Really Manipulate The Price?
On February 4, the price of the meme cryptocurrency rose 25% in a matter of minutes. The increase took place after Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk posted a photo of a rocket flying to the moon, and in a comment added: "Doge." Two days later, Elon continued the pump by releasing a poll asking if Dogecoin would be the future currency of the earth. 71.3% of the 2.4 million respondents said yes.
Just over seven hours later after this tweet (15 February), Dogecoin's price fell 23%, from $0.063 to $0.048. While Musk's tweets have previously been attributed to cryptocurrency price movements, not just Dogecoin, his role in this decline was less obvious. For at the same time, more than $105 billion flowed out of the overall market.
Losses in excess of 20% are a common sight in cryptocurrency market capitalization rankings. Altcoins, in particular, often experience a huge rebound. Analysts suggest that this time the decline was caused by Bitcoin (BTC) hitting a new all-time high a few hours earlier. This caused a drop in volume in the altcoin market.
During the first two weeks of February, the cryptocurrency's price rose nearly 200% from $0.03 to just under $0.09. Since then, DOGE has been slowly consolidating near $0.05.
Some users speculated that the rise in Dogecoin's price was not entirely organic and that the 85% price pump was carried out by Reddit group /WallStreetBets. A few days later, Kiss band leader Gene Simmons announced an investment. This prompted another 40% increase in 24 hours.
Elon Musk's favorite cryptocurrency Dogecoin (DOGE) is now available in 1,800 bitcoins across the United States. All thanks to the company Coinflip.
Coinflip announced support for Dogecoin on March 1. The company's CEO and co-founder, Daniel Polotsky, attributes the move to the recent "popularity and mass adoption of DOGE."
Coinflip has seen astronomical growth in demand over the past year. The company's revenue more than tripled as it increased the number of ATMs from 441 to about 1,800. Coinflip ATMs are installed in 45 of the 50 U.S. states. In addition to DOGE, it also supports BTC, ETH, BNB, DASH, LTC, LINK, USDC, and XLM.
