Dogecoin, which started as a joke, was the sixth most valuable cryptocurrency as of Thursday.
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June
4, 2021
2 min read
This story originally appeared on Business Insider
Coinbase said on Thursday that it plans to give away $1.2 million in dogecoin to encourage users to take advantage of its newest cryptocurrency trading option.
Related: Dogecoin Added to Coinbase, Price Surges
Users must buy or sell $100 in DOGE through Coinbase by June 10 to be eligible for the sweepstakes, the company said. Coinbase said it plans to give out one prize worth $300,000, 10 prizes worth $30,000, and 6,000 prizes worth $100 by around June 17.
The sweepstakes follows the company’s announcement on Tuesday that it would start letting Coinbase Pro users trade dogecoin on its platform.
Related: Elon Musk Tweets, Dogecoin Surges
The announcement, along with a tweet from Elon Musk referencing the meme currency, sent dogecoin’s value climbing by as much as 41%.
At $52.3 billion, dogecoin had the sixth-largest market cap among all cryptocurrencies as of Thursday evening, according to CoinMarketCap, after seeing a massive rally in May that sent its market cap soaring to more than $85 billion.
Dogecoin was started as a joke by two engineers in 2013, but has since gained immense popularity thanks to Redditors as well as endorsements from Musk and other high-profile celebrities, leading other crypto trading platforms like Robinhood, eToro, and Gemini to start accepting trades in recent weeks.