Dogecoin's 9% Swing Amid Fake Rumor of Mascot's Death Riles Up Crypto Enthusiasts

• Dogecoin jumped 9% on a later-recanted social media rumor about the death of the token's mascot.
• The volatile episode irked crypto market observers as liquidations soared on the fake news.

Dogecoin [DOGE] swung wildly on Tuesday as a social media rumor about the death of the popular meme coin's mascot turned out to be fake, riling up crypto observers.

DOGE price jumped as much as 9% to 8.3 cents after pseudonymous X (formerly Twitter) user TraderAguila posted a screenshot of a Telegram conversation in Japanese that alleged that Kabuso, the token dog for the cryptocurrency, passed away.

Soon after, the author deleted the X post and went private, saying the screenshot turned out to be fake. Later they deleted the account altogether.

DOGE pared most of its gains and retraced to around 8 cents, but still higher than the 7.7 cents it changed hands before the fake news.

The episode riled up crypto observers as it added fuel to the asset class' bad reputation of alleged market manipulation and speculative nature.

"The charts people are painting while speculating over the death of an animal make me think we're either all going to hell or we're already there," widely-followed crypto market observer Tree of Alpha opined.

The volatile period also irked some DOGE traders as the swift price swing wiped out leveraged trading positions. CoinGlass data shows that over $674,000 worth of leveraged derivatives trades got liquidated within an hour, topping all other crypto asset liquidations including bitcoin.

Dogecoin started off as a joke cryptocurrency in 2013 but amassed a huge global following, including Elon Musk, and now has a market capitalization exceeding $11 billion.

The events came at a time when the crypto market is attracting outsized attention, awaiting regulatory approval of a sought-after spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) in the U.S., which is considered a landmark win for the industry's maturation.

For full coverage of bitcoin ETFs, click here.

Notably, bitcoin [BTC] price briefly spiked in October, when crypto-focused news outlet CoinTelegraph falsely tweeted that asset manager BlackRock's application was approved by regulators.