Elon Musk's fascination with Dogecoin is pretty well known. From time to time, Musk tweets about the "memecoin", as it was originally planned to be. Now, Musk has gone a step further and tried to get McDonald's, the global fast-food restaurant chain to accept Dogecoin for payments, by tweeting
I will eat a happy meal on tv if @McDonalds accepts Dogecoin
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 25, 2022
This didn't happen randomly though. As Business Insider reported, Billy Markus, the co-founder of Dogecoin had actually interacted with McDonald's Twitter handle last week, asking for a fry and the fast-food company's social media handle responded with an image of a Shiba Inu, Dogecoin's mascot with a fry.
While the interaction ended there, given the downward swing cryptocurrencies have seen recently, McDonald's Twitter sent out a teasing tweet.
how are you doing people who run crypto twitter accounts
— McDonald's (@McDonalds) January 24, 2022
It was after this that Musk jumped in baiting McDonald's to start accepting Dogecoin. The last time, Musk tweeted about this coin was to declare his own company would accept it as payment for its certain merch. Billy Markus jumped in as well, promising to eat a happy meal watching Musk eat one on TV. As Business Insider reported, Dogecoin's valuation saw a four percent surge immediately following the tweet.
But, McDonald's Twitter handle did not fall for it and instead threw up a challenge at Musk instead.
only if @tesla accepts grimacecoin https://t.co/CQrmAFelHR pic.twitter.com/to9HmYJhej
— McDonald's (@McDonalds) January 25, 2022
To clarify, even as other chains are looking to enter the cryptocurrencies arena, McDonald's hasn't launched a grimace or any other altcoin of its own.
Nevertheless, a large number of grimacecoins began appearing on blockchain networks, CoinDesk reported. The coin had 1,000 holders on Ethereum and went up 56,000 percent in valuation within hours of its launch.
We are up 56,000% since launch. Just wait till Elon sees us! pic.twitter.com/gRVI1ErJ8l
— Grimace Coin (@grimacecoineth) January 26, 2022
The valuation is likely to drop down once the hype around the tweets dies, but that's the nature of crypto tokens that can be created at will and see massive surges and falls.