Japanese dog who inspired cryptocurrency DogeCoin dies at age 18

By Louis Goss

Kabosu, the Japanese dog who became the face of the cryptocurrency DogeCoin, has died at the age of 18.

The Shiba Inu, who had been suffering from leukemia and liver disease, passed away peacefully on Friday, her owner said in a post on Instagram.

"On the morning of the 24th of May, Kabosu crossed the rainbow bridge," Atsuko Sato said in the post. "She went very peacefully without suffering, as if falling asleep while feeling the warmth of my hands petting her."

DogeCoin (DOGEUSD) prices were up 5.1% Friday, having gained 82.9% in the year to date.

The expressive dog gained worldwide fame as the centerpiece of the hugely popular "Doge" internet meme, which used pictures of Kabosu overlaid with captions written in the comic sans font.

She later became the face of the cryptocurrency DogeCoin, which was launched as a joke in December 2013 using Kabosu's image.

DogeCoin now has a market capitalization of almost $24 billion, having built a cult following of prominent people including Snoop Dogg and Elon Musk.

The meme coin, which was created by American software engineers Billy Markus and Jackson Palmer, was initially launched to satirize widespread volatility in cryptocurrency markets.

DogeCoin prices later surged during the COVID-19 pandemic to as much as 64 cents per coin in May 2021, after Space X founder Musk announced he would be sending a satellite to space called DOGE-1.

Musk said his DOGE-1 space mission would be entirely paid for in DogeCoin. He also expressed his support for the meme coin on the social-media platform Twitter, which he later bought and renamed X.

DogeCoin later became the official sponsor of English soccer club Watford F.C. in a deal worth more than GBP700,000.

Kabosu's owner Sato, a kindergarten teacher in Japan, took the Shiba Inu into her home in 2008 after adopting her from an animal shelter.

"I still remember her on the first day she came home. She was scared, sitting in the corner of the room, motionless and silent. She simply stared at me with those big round eyes," Sato said in a post on Instagram.

"It has been 15 years since that day and those big round eyes have filled my heart with so much happiness and gratitude," she said.

The dog became a global sensation after Sato posted a picture of her with crossed paws and an expressive smirk on a blog in 2010.

A statue of Kabosu was erected in the Japanese city of Sakura last year.

On Friday, Musk posted an image of Kabosu and a gorilla with angel wings on X. "OG Doge has ascended to heaven to be with his friend Harambe," he added in a subsequent post. In 2016, zookeepers at the Cincinnati Zoo sparked controversy when they shot and killed Harambe, a male silverback gorilla, after a 4-year-old boy fell into his enclosure.

-Louis Goss

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05-24-24 1241ET

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