Unlike crypto, which grows because of real-world utility, the reason behind the growing popularity of meme coins is because of strong community support.

Among the meme coins that have grown dramatically is the SHIB coin. Let’s answer essential questions like what it is and where to buy Shiba coin.

What is a SHIB coin?

Shiba Inu is a native Japanese dog breed. It is the symbol for Dogecoin. An anonymous user in a Japanese group created a token that shares a name with the dog breed to add to the dog meme cryptocurrencies. Shiba Inu’s popularity increased so much in 2021 that it now threatens Dogecoin. It became more popular than other meme coins, including Dogelon Mars, Akita Inu, and Floki Inu.

SHIB is an ERC-20 token based on Ethereum, robust and secure crypto with decentralization support. Just one year after its inception, the value of the SHIB coin increased by 150 million percent. The coin has the backing of many supporters, popularly known as the ShibArmy. Many online influencers promote the currency. In 2021, the SHIB coin surpassed the number of Twitter followers for popular coins like Solana, Cardano, and Ethereum. The coin’s popularity grew after Ethereum’s lead engineer donated $1 billion worth of SHIB coins to coronavirus mitigation in India.

How many total SHIB coins exist?

One of the jaw-dropping statistics of the Shiba Inu is its total supply. At inception, one quadrillion SHIB tokens were minted. It is the highest number of any crypto ever developed.

Ryoshi, the developer of SHIB, transferred half of the supply of SHIB coins to Uniswap. Uniswap is a decentralized crypto exchange where users swap cryptos using smart contracts. Ryoshi moved the remaining half of the SHIB coins to Vitalik Buterin with the hope that he would lock them away forever. People criticized why he would transfer such a large amount to a wealthy individual. However, Buterin appeased the community by donating 50% of his holdings to COVID relief efforts in India. He still owns 45% of all SHIB coins. It raises questions about whether the SHIB is decentralized.