Dogecoin jumps 30% after Elon Musk replaces Twitter bird with Shiba Inu

The cryptocurrency rose as high as 10.4 US cents after the change to the social media platform

The value of cryptocurrency Dogecoin has soared since Elon Musk replaced Twitter's logo with the meme coin. Getty

Dogecoin rose as much as 30 per cent after Twitter users noticed their home buttons changed into the cryptocurrency's symbol of a Shiba Inu.

Some Twitter users began to notice the home button in the top left corner of their web browsers — usually the company’s solid blue bird logo — replaced with a cartoon of the Shiba Inu at about 1.45pm New York time on Monday.

Dogecoin rose to as high as 10.4 US cents from about 7.7 cents after the change. At 8.15am UAE time on Tuesday, Dogecoin had edged back to 9.5 cents.

Doge also began to trend on Twitter.

The shift comes days after Twitter began making changes to its verification system.

Some accounts with so-called legacy verification, like The New York Times, had their check marks removed. Others have kept their checks with a note they were either Blue subscribers or legacy verified accounts.

Twitter did not respond to a question about the home button change.

Two hours after the change, Twitter owner Elon Musk, who has long touted Dogecoin on the social media platform, posted a photo of an earlier exchange in which a Twitter user urged him to change the bird logo to a doge.

Mr Musk tweeted: “As promised.”

On Friday, Mr Musk asked a US judge to dismiss a $258 billion racketeering lawsuit accusing him of running a pyramid scheme to support Dogecoin, Reuters reported.

In an evening filing in Manhattan federal court, lawyers for Mr Musk and his electric car company Tesla called the lawsuit by Dogecoin investors a “fanciful work of fiction” over his “innocuous and often silly tweets” about Dogecoin, Reuters said.

“There is nothing unlawful about tweeting words of support for, or funny pictures about, a legitimate cryptocurrency that continues to hold a market cap of nearly $10 billion,” Mr Musk's lawyers said.

“This court should put a stop to plaintiffs' fantasy and dismiss the complaint.”