‘Dogecoin Millionaire’ Is Now a Pepe Millionaire—And He’s Stacking These Meme Coins Next

Glauber Contessoto rose to crypto fame in 2021 when he grew to become what was believed to be the primary “Dogecoin Millionaire”—a title he wore proudly. Now, 4 years later, he’s claimed the title of “Pepe Millionaire,” whereas his DOGE stash has dipped barely beneath that milestone degree.

Throughout six wallets shared and verified with Decrypt, Contessoto now owns roughly $1.116 million of the Ethereum meme coin PEPE.

That is along with his Dogecoin stash that he has change into well-known for. Contessoto claims to personal “a bit bit over” 5 million DOGE which might put him within the ballpark of $920,000 at right now’s value. DOGE is down almost 12% over the past month. And sure, he nonetheless hasn’t offered any Dogecoin—despite saying he would.

Contessoto mentioned that he purchased $100,000 value of three meme cash again in spring 2024: Pepe, Brett, and Dogwifhat. Each Pepe and Brett have elevated in worth since then, to his pleasure, whereas Dogwifhat is down 82% from its all-time excessive reached throughout that interval.

Then, this February, Contessoto mentioned he rage-quit holding Ethereum (ETH) attributable to its poor value efficiency through the prior months, and swapped all of his tokens for Pepe. 

“[It was] tons of of hundreds of {dollars},” he laughed. “I used to be like, you realize what? Fuck it. I offered out all of my ETH, utterly offered all the pieces, and put all of it into Pepe.”

With Pepe’s value rising 36.96% for the reason that finish of February, this was sufficient to hail Contessoto as a millionaire in his second meme coin. However, why Pepe?

“I feel Pepe might be one of many solely different memes which are up there with Doge when it comes to how recognizable they’re,” Contessoto advised Decrypt. “Even when you do not know the identify Pepe, you have seen the face of Pepe. You have seen it on some discussion board someplace, in a meme on Fb, clearly on Twitter, Reddit. Pepe simply has such an iconic attain.”

Plus, he likes that Pepe is extra of an edgy meme, particularly when in comparison with his darling Dogecoin, which is rooted in family-friendly, healthful love. In spite of everything, a standard mantra amongst DOGE supporters is “Do Only Good Everyday.” Finally, the Pepe Millionaire mentioned, the meme represents web tradition at its deepest and darkest.

Pepe the Frog was initially created by artist Matt Furie, as a part of his comedian collection “Boy’s Membership” in 2005. However by 2016, the Anti-Defamation League added the frog to its database of hate symbols, alongside logos just like the swastika. It’s because it had been adopted by the alt-right motion with anti-Semitic and racist variations of the meme spreading throughout 4chan, 8chan, and Reddit.

“Pepe isn’t speculated to signify that within the first place,” Contessoto mentioned. “They took it and did what they needed with it—however that does not make the meme itself unhealthy.”

Within the 2020 documentary “Feels Good Man,” Furie makes an attempt to combat towards his work getting used as an emblem for hate by way of a string of copyright infringement lawsuits, which he principally loses. One main victory, nevertheless, was the frog getting used as an emblem for hope by pro-democracy protestors in Hong Kong—which Furie cherished.

“Pepe to [the whole world] is recognizable,” the Pepe Millionaire added. “You bought Pepe in all completely different languages.”

Contessoto isn’t trying to cease there. As an alternative he desires to change into a millionaire in meme cash Brett and Floki too—each of which he says he additionally invested $100,000 into. Being a meme coin millionaire throughout a number of tokens wasn’t the unique goal, he mentioned, however now he’s embraced the purpose.

“It is simply sort of enjoyable,” he mentioned. “It’s my factor, I suppose.”

At this level, it’s solely pure to query the place the Dogecoin Millionaire is getting his capital from, particularly contemplating he by no means offered his DOGE fortunes. Contessoto defined that when he rose to crypto fame in 2021, he was making $10,000 a month on YouTube whereas additionally working a job doing voiceovers for music publication HipHopDX.

“I simply sort of took that entire momentum I had in 2021 and tried to make as a lot cash as I may,” he advised Decrypt. “With that, I had YouTube cash, I had merch cash, after which I had a number of stuff simply with the documentary that was occurring too. I used to be getting talking engagements and we have been doing showings of the documentary at completely different areas—they paid me for that.”

Since then, he’s additionally change into considerably of a social media influencer that sells sponsored posts, and has been paid to run advertising campaigns for different initiatives.

Deploying capital is the straightforward half, he mentioned—promoting is the actual problem. 

Contessoto has held onto his Dogecoin fortunes ever since his first buy, claiming to have by no means offered a single penny. Beforehand, in November, he advised Decrypt that he deliberate to begin promoting off DOGE when he believed Bitcoin was reaching its peak. 

Bitcoin has since hit a number of all-time excessive peaks, together with most not too long ago in Might, however he nonetheless didn’t promote as he believes it nonetheless isn’t the suitable time. 

Will he make the identical mistake once more and maintain his DOGE even additional beneath the $1 million mark?

“No, bro, belief me, I’ll [sell],” Contessoto asserted. “I am not going previous 2025 with out promoting not less than half of my Dogecoin. […] I am not round-tripping shit ever once more. It is not value it, man—not value it in any respect, bro.”

Edited by Andrew Hayward