Key takeaways
- Amid the post-election cryptocurrency rally, dogecoin’s market value has surpassed that of companies like Ford and General Mills.
- Tesla CEO Elon Musk has repeatedly promoted dogecoin and spent millions to support President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign.
- Trump said Tuesday that Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy would lead a DOGE “Government Effectiveness Advisory Department.”
The price of dogecoin (DOGEUSD, DOGE) surged Wednesday after President-elect Donald Trump named his backers Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to head a new “Department of Government Effectiveness,” or DOGE.
An individual dogecoin was worth about 40 cents Wednesday afternoon, up from 36 cents overnight and about 17 cents before the presidential election results were known last Tuesday. The coin’s rise has pushed its market capitalization to around $60 billion, making the original coin more valuable than household names like Ford (F), Delta Airlines (DAL) and General Mills (GIS).
Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTCUSD) and stocks of crypto companies like Coinbase (COIN) also have increased last week. Leaders across the industry have hailed Trump’s victorysaying they think a Trump administration is probably friendly to the crypto industry.
Musk’s ties to Dogecoin and Trump
Musk was a long time fan dogecoin, born from a photo of a Shiba Inu which became a recurring joke on the Internet in the 2010s. The Tesla (TSLA) The CEO frequently took to social media to promote the piece; he was accused in a now-dismissed lawsuit of inflating the coin’s value for personal gain.
Tesla in January 2022 started accepting dogecoin as a method of payment for certain products in its online store.
Musk supported Trump’s candidacy this year. THE political action committee (PAC) he spent at least $200 million supporting the Trump campaign leading up to last week’s election. Musk, also CEO of SpaceX and other companiessaid he wanted help Trump cut $2 trillion in government spending in the years to come.
What is the Department of Government Effectiveness?
On Tuesday, Trump announced that Musk and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, a former rival for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination, would co-lead a “Department of Government Effectiveness,” a likely nod to dogecoin.
Trump said Tuesday that the department would “lead the way for my administration to dismantle government bureaucracy, reduce excessive regulations, cut wasteful spending, and restructure federal agencies.”
The group “will provide advice and guidance from outside the government and partner with the White House and the Office of Management and Budget to drive large-scale structural reform,” Trump’s statement said. THE Office of Management and Budget (OMB) manages implementation of the President’s agenda by developing budgets and overseeing agency performance.
Trump did not say how big the department would be or how it would be funded.