Elon Musk Brands BOB’s Twitter Bot a ‘Scam’, Meme Coin Plummets by 45%
In a dramatic turn of events, Elon Musk’s declaration of the meme cryptocurrency BOB’s Twitter bot as a “fraud” sent the coin spiraling down by 45%. Musk, a previous advocate of the coin, had on multiple occasions interacted with the bot, contributing to BOB’s value appreciation.
Sunday witnessed the plummet of BOB from $0.000031 to a dismal $0.000016, eroding its market cap to $13 million. The fall mirrored the meme token’s continued depreciation since May’s high of a $74 million market cap.
BOB’s Twitter bot @ExplainThisBob, notorious for its sassy, humor-infused summaries, had taken Twitter by storm in late April. Musk’s endearing “I love bob” reply to one of the bot’s posts had sent the token’s price soaring. Musk even commended Bob’s contribution to a political discussion in June, tweeting, “Once again, Bob nails it.”
However, Musk recently expressed that Twitter would be more stringent, suspending accounts attempting to manipulate its verification system or indulge in deceptive self-promotion or advertising. This crackdown also saw the suspension of WASSIE, @AskTheWassie, another automated bot modelled after @ExplainThisBob, which used a comic frog as its mascot.
Musk’s announcement and subsequent actions against deceptive practices on Twitter, including those of the BOB bot, have evidently caused a significant ripple in the meme coin market.
