Two brothers became millionaires after investing $8,000 into Shiba Inu in 2020.
The meme coin, which was first created in August of that year, saw its popularity rapidly grow in the first 12 months of its existence.
Tommy and James, who do not wish for their surnames to be made public, had both become unemployed due to the Covid pandemic and started to experiment with investing in cryptocurrency.
The brothers invested an initial $200 each into SHIB to see what happened.
Tommy explained: “I kind of thought about Bitcoin — that was once a fraction of a penny and now it’s tens of thousands of dollars, and this happens to people, it’s possible.
“I trusted my friend and I figured if it went to zero, that’s OK. I thought of it as a lotto ticket that wouldn’t expire.”
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They were left shocked when their initial $400 combined investment quickly turned into $1,200.
Excited by the quick success, the pair decided to invest further funds, even borrowing money from family to do so.
In total they raised $8,000 to put into the meme coin.
As SHIB grew a loyal following and more and more people invested in the cryptocurrency, its value exploded.
An 11,000 per cent surge in the value of Shiba Inu over an eight-month period saw the brothers’ $8,000 holding grow to be worth $9million.
Tommy said: “Oh my God. We woke up the next morning and it doubled.
“Then it went up to $700,000 and I told my brother it’s going to hit a million.
“I kept refreshing my phone. The next day, it happened.
“The day it hit a million — my mom and sister, they didn’t think it was real.”
SHIB’s price peaked in October 2021 when it reached a record value of $0.00008845.
However, since then it has seen a nearly 90 per cent drop in its worth.
It remains unclear if and when Tommy and James cashed out their crypto holdings and how much money they therefore ultimately made from it.