A $575 Investment in a Shiba-Inspired Token Surges to $1.17 Million in Just 5 Days

The season of memecoins continues to yield life-changing trades for those willing to take the leap. An anonymous investor bought 2.79 billion ASTEROID tokens, a memecoin themed after a Shiba Inu drawing, for $575 on April 17 and sold the entire stake for 503 ETH on Tuesday, worth approximately $1.17 million, as per on-chain tracker Lookonchain. This transaction, which took just five days to complete, resulted in a return of more than 2,000%. ASTEROID, an Ethereum-based memecoin dubbed 'First Shiba In Space,' is inspired by a Shiba Inu sketch created by Liv Perrotto, a teenage cancer patient who passed away in January 2026 after battling the disease for five years. Prior to her passing, Perrotto had sketched the dog while volunteering for SpaceX's Polaris Dawn ground support team, with the design later flying on the Polaris Dawn mission as the crew's zero-gravity indicator. The sketch, inspired by Elon Musk's own Shiba Inu named Floki, was also accompanied by a special letter to space. Before her death, Perrotto had written down eight questions she hoped to ask Musk, with the final one inquiring if Asteroid could become SpaceX's official mascot. After her mother shared the list publicly and media personality Glenn Beck amplified it, Musk responded with an 'ok,' indicating his willingness to make Asteroid the official SpaceX mascot. This response sparked a surge in the token's market cap, which skyrocketed from approximately $50,000 to over $20 million within hours of Musk's reply and eventually surpassed $100 million with over $100 million in 24-hour trading volume. At its peak, the token briefly entered the top 200 cryptocurrencies by market cap and currently trades at $0.0004435 with a $186.5 million market cap and $24 million in 24-hour volume. Notably, the token lacks formal SpaceX endorsement, licensing arrangement, or confirmed Musk involvement beyond social media interactions. It is traded on Uniswap against wrapped ether, with a market cap of $186.5 million and a 24-hour trading volume of $24.3 million. The price has increased by 20.69% over 24 hours, 28.54% over six hours, and has climbed about 10x from the wallet's entry point on April 17, according to DEX Screener data.