The meme-inspired cryptocurrency Shiba Inu ($SHIB) has become the third most used token on the Ethereum network after only two major stablecoins, USDT and USDC, as holders are becoming more active, even amid negative price action.
According to data from Ethereum blockchain explorer Etherscan, as Finbold reports, Shiba Inu had over 78,000 unique users over the last seven days, while Tether’s USDT had 485,900 and the Centre Consortium’s USDC had 232,300.
Behind Shiba Inu, data shows, was Wrapped Ether (WETH) with nearly 72,000 unique users and Matic Token (MATIC) with 56,100 unique users.
Notably, the figure shows that most Shiba Inu investors are simply holding onto their tokens, as Etherscan’s data shows there are currently 1.075 million SHIB holders on the blockchain. As CryptoGlobe reported, the number of addresses holding SHIB surpassed the one million mark in November.
Ethereum whales have notably been accumulating SHIB over the last few months. One whale with over $800 million in various cryptoassets added over 1.67 trillion tokens to its wallet, while another one with $300 million in assets added 72 billion SHIB tokens, worth just over $2.5 million, to its portfolio. The meme-inspired cryptocurrency is the whale’s largest holding.
As CryptoGlobe reported another well-known whale, Gimli, has been also accumulating SHIB. Gimli added SHIB in transactions worth millions of dollars to get close to $100 million worth of the meme-inspired cryptocurrency in its wallet.
Data has shown that whale transactions have helped fuel Shiba Inu’s price rise this year. According to cryptocurrency analytics firm Santiment, SHIB transactions exceeding $100,000 have generally surged ahead of cryptocurrency price rises. Notably, whales may be accumulating even more of the cryptocurrency ahead of these rises.
Shiba Inu’s price has notably been on a downtrend over the last few months and is now down over 57% from its all-time high, CryptoCompare data shows.
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