The alleged godfather of the top meme cryptocurrency, Dogecoin, has been sued for $258 billion for intentionally driving the price of this meme coin high using his influence as the wealthiest person in the world.
The SpaceX and Tesla CEO is well known for his avid enthusiasm and support for Dogecoin. Elon Musk was regularly seen tweeting in favor of this meme coin in January last year. Coincidently, the Dogecoin price witnessed a meteoric rise, increasing from $0.005 to $0.74, around an 18,000% gain within 4 months.
A man named Keith Johnson, who claims himself an American Investor, blamed Elon Musk and his activities pertaining to the intentional promotion of Dogecoin as cause for losing his money.
According to the lawsuit filed in Manhattan, New York, Elon Musk has used his influence to operate the ‘Dogecoin Pyramid Scheme for Profit‘.
“Musk used his pedestal as the world’s richest man to operate and manipulate the Dogecoin pyramid scheme for profit, exposure, and amusement.”
Johnson v. Musk, 22-cv-05037Keith Johnson says that along with recovering damage that occurred due to the intended advertisement of Dogecoin, he wants to stop Elon Musk from promoting any altcoin again and declare that trading Dogecoin is equivalent to gambling.
The plaintiff has also included the statement of Bill Gates and Warren Buffett on virtual assets to validate his claim on Dogecoin.
Musk has not yet responded to this lawsuit so far. However, The world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange CEO, Changpeng Zhao, also known as CZ, reacted to this matter on Twitter. In a tweet, he defended Musk by pointing out innocent until proven guilty.
While the claims of Johnson are yet to be investigated by the court, Musk’s love for Dogecoin is evident and well-known in the crypto community. A couple of months ago, Elon Musk criticized Bitcoin, claiming that it can’t be a mainstream payment method due to its drawbacks. Furthermore, he also included Dogecoin as a payment method for Tesla products. The official Tesla website reads, “Tesla only accepts Dogecoin. Tesla cannot receive or detect any other digital assets.”