An intriguing post by Ethereum cofounder Vitalik Buterin on the X/Twitter platform recently shone a spotlight on the Shiba Inu (SHIB) meme cryptocurrency. This post sparked a range of reactions from both the SHIB community and various crypto influencers. Shytoshi Kusama, the lead figure of SHIB, enthusiastically joined the conversation in response to Buterin's tweet.

The genesis of this dialogue was Buterin's recollection of a significant event involving the Shiba Inu cryptocurrency. In 2021, he was gifted a massive amount of SHIB—exactly 500 billion coins, half of the meme coin's total supply—by the project's anonymous founder, Ryoshi. Buterin made the decision to donate a substantial portion of this SHIB to charity under the assumption that its value would drop significantly. He aimed to ensure that the charities could receive between $10 million and $25 million from the donation. However, SHIB’s impressive performance exceeded his expectations, much to the delight of the SHIB community.

The sparking of excitement in the crypto market continued with a report from the cryptocurrency tracking bot Whale Alert, which highlighted a significant withdrawal of SHIB from the KuCoin exchange. A whopping two trillion Shiba Inu coins, valued at approximately $62,232,000, were transferred from the platform. This withdrawal was part of a larger trend where KuCoin lost around $500 million worth of cryptocurrencies within a 24-hour period after reports emerged of criminal charges against KuCoin and its founders by the U.S. Department of Justice. The charges included allegations of operating a platform that enabled illicit money laundering and violating the Bank Secrecy Act.

This case against KuCoin had similarities to a previous accusation against former Binance CEO, CZ. The allegations were related to activities between 2020 and 2022, during which the platform reportedly received significant funds from the sanctioned entity Tornado Cash without reporting suspicious transactions.