After three impressive attempts, the cryptocurrency market has finally smashed through the significant resistance level of $140 billion, reaching a spectacular high of $148 billion over the weekend.

While all the major top the coins have benefited from slight gains, its the smaller altcoins can be thanked for the long-awaited rally.

The bizarre Internet meme-turned-cryptocurrency, Dogecoin (DOGE), has been particularly successful of late. DOGE has shot up by over 20 percent in the past few hours, with a huge injection of volume that reached almost half a million dollars at one point. As with most cryptocurrencies, DOGE has suffered through an extended bear market that has seen it lose over 50 percent of its value in the past twelve months. Its current price is the highest its been since late December last year.

The cryptocurrency, named after a popular Internet meme featuring a Shiba-Inu dog, was launched as a joke back in 2013 by programmer Billy Markus in collaboration with Jackson Palmer. However, it quickly gained popularity and amassed a market capitalization of $60 million by January the following year.

DOGE has now broken clear of the significant $0.0022 resistance level after several attempts and is now aiming for $0.0026. After months of sideways trading, it has finally begun a new upward trend, moving north of the ascending triangle that has been forming for the past week.

The reason behind Dogecoin’s sudden gains are not immediately apparent, but it seems the cryptocurrency market is benefiting from an altcoin rally at the moment. Several other coins, including Ravencoin (RVN), Zcash (ZEC), Dash (DASH) and Huobi Token (HT) are all experiencing gains of over 10 percent today.

By comparison, the top three digital assets Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum, (ETH) and XRP, are only up by between one and two percent.