Just when the crypto dust caused by Steven Seagal was settling down, Elon Musk, founder of the electric car company, Tesla, posted a tweet pro-applauding dogecoin. Apparently, such a mere publicity from a reputable figure in the fintech industry, excited the price of Dogecoin to rise by 5%. Does that mean celebrities have the power to speed up crypto adoption?

As cryptocurrencies rose to astounding prices in 2017, they began to attract the attention of many people that the public wouldn’t typically expect to be interested in this sort of technology, including dozens of celebrities from a wide variety of backgrounds.

Apart from Elon’s Twitter-theatrics, there is no doubt that celebrities’ endorsements on crypto can have a serious effect on the assets’ value and public relations. When celebrities with very large audiences on social media share their enthusiasm for certain digital tokens, they spread the word about the coins to new groups who might not otherwise have paid any attention to them.

For instance, Musk, who might be quite easily crypto’s favorite non-crypto personality, has come out to reveal his support for Dogecoin via twitter, where he indirectly said that they ‘have the best coin’. The Tesla and SpaceX CEO is no stranger to the crypto world and has regularly shared his feelings about some digital assets.

This isn’t the first time Elon Musk is publicly endorsing the asset. Sometime last year, he tweeted support for the coin after a poll held on April fool’s Day, where he was jokingly selected as the CEO of Dogecoin.

The comment by Elon Musk seems to have positively affected the price of Dogecoin, with the coin currently trading $0.0024.

Other Notable Cases of Celebrities Endorsing Crypto

Ripple has made headlines for its many advancements and use cases, but it has also attracted attention for its connection with Hollywood A-listers.

For instance, at the Swell conference, which was hosted by the Ripple in San Francisco last October, the team invited former U.S president Bill Clinton to be the keynote speaker invited by Ripple at their conference.

Ripple cites that it was Clinton’s tenure that helped bring forth the adoption of the Internet, and made it into the essential tool that is now ingrained in our day-to-day life.

The president stated that the potential blockchain technology has, is because it is the only financial entity that’s applicable across national borders and in varying income groups.

A-list pop singer Madonna was also another celeb that joined the XRP bandwagon. Her fundraising campaign for Malawi, which was held from July 30 to August 16 with the occasion of her 60th birthday, promised to give for each donated Ripple on a dollar.

The fundraising was set to raise $60,000, but many more XRPs came pouring in, the charity amassing approximately $200,000.

Similarly, A-List actor Ashton Kutcher has also proven himself a serious venture capitalist, and he’s been interested in cryptos since long before their 2017 spike in value.

Kutcher tweeted about Ethereum over a year before the project was released, and he has invested in several cryptocurrency-related startups since then.

Even more interestingly, Senegalese-American artist Akon just last month finalized a landmark deal to create his own city in his home country of Senegal. In order to insulate the new city from political turmoil and volatile economic practices, the entire city will be run on cryptocurrency. The newly minted AKoin will be the foundation of the city’s trade.

Besides the personalities mentioned above, there’s a ton of other celebs who could be bitcoin rich from past investments. This includes people like Hugh Laurie, Mike Tyson, Mel B, Lionel Messi, and Johnny Depp, all of whom could have significant stashes of crypto.

Not All Crypto Endorsements Succeed

However, not all cryptocurrencies embraced by celebrities are successful; Floyd Mayweather, DJ Khaled, and Steven Seagal have made some embarrassing blunders by endorsing ICOs for companies that went on to face legal challenges that they couldn’t overcome.

As we had reported on February 27. 2020, the SEC decided to fine American actor Steven Seagal for accepting crypto payments from a 2017 ICO, Bitcoiin2Gen.

The problem, according to the SEC, is that Seagal was supposed to explain to investors that it was just an advertising stunt and that he was paid by Bitcoiin2Gen to support them. The coin is now practically worthless, a loss of 33% in the last few days and a daily volume of about $56.

Similarly, Floyd Mayweather and DJ Khaled had also been fined by the SEC for using their social media profiles to endorse the Centra token, having to pay a fine of $600,000 and $150,000 in 2018, respectively.

