Elon Musk Ruffles the Waters of the Crypto Market, KEKIUS Tumbles 70% After His Profile Change

Elon Musk ruffled the waters of the crypto market once more as he persisted in changing up his antics on social media.

Elon Musk has once again caused ripples in the crypto market with his antics on social media. After briefly changing his handle to “Kekius Maximus” on X (formerly Twitter) following 31 December, an update to the profile drove the memecoin Kekius Maximus to record lows.

Inspired by Pepe the Frog and Maximus Decimus Meridius, the Roman hero, the token surged about 500% to reach all-time highs (ATH) at $0.40 on 1 January amid enthusiasm over Musk's profile change.

However, as the market realized that Musk had reverted to his reclusive self, it saw a massive sell-off. KEKIUS market capitalization dropped from $400 million to $120 million within an hour, while the price also fell by over 70%, settling at $0.1157.

The dramatic price drop was further fueled by a huge sell-off from a whale account (0x8201.) that sold a large amount of KEKIUS tokens. The panic triggered a further decline in the token's price, with the daily trading volume reaching $348 million. The whale made a profit of $2.3 million, leaving smaller investors scrambling to mitigate their losses.

Musk, whose social media updates often create ripples in the markets, had earlier sparked rumors about his connection to the token.

However, no official link has confirmed the connection to the KEKIUS project. Musk's cryptic remarks about level 80 in hardcore PoE suggested that the profile change related to a video game rather than the memecoin.

This wasn't the case with KEKIUS, as memecoins like Pepe (PEPE) also dropped by 2.7% during the day. The impact was thus reflective of an interconnectedness among memecoin markets that often gets hit collectively whenever the trend turns.

At the time of writing, KEKIUS was trading at $0.1434 PEPE traded at $0.00002061. Dramatic price moves are characteristic when investing in these memecoins, where quick winnings and losses follow each other day after day.

While it remains unclear, the incident demonstrates that Musk continues to influence the cryptocurrency market with everything he does, whether intentionally or not. His actions continue to captivate the crypto community and prove once again that his social media presence has a significant bearing on market sentiment.