AUSTIN, Texas — Tesla CEO Elon Musk has denied owning Dogecoin in response to a lawsuit accusing him of price manipulation involving the meme-based cryptocurrency.
The New York Post reported on Thursday that Musk’s lawyer Alex Spiro said that allegations that his client and Tesla own Dogecoin wallets are incorrect and baseless.
In a letter reviewed by the Post, Spiro said that the evidence against Musk and his company is circumstantial.
“The sole basis for your claim is that these wallets sold Dogecoin at a time when, according to the Third Amended Complaint, prices were up,” he wrote to the plaintiff’s lawyer Evan Spencer.
“You specifically allege, without basis, that the following wallets ‘belong’ to Defendants,” Spiro added. “You are wrong.”
Musk faces a proposed $258 million class action lawsuit accusing him of insider trading and manipulating Dogecoin.
The amended complaint presented evidence of Musk’s ownership of the disputed wallet by citing a tweet he posted on Feb. 10, 2021, when he openly declared his acquisition of 28.061971 worth of Dogecoin.
Accusing Musk of exploiting Dogecoin for personal gain, investors claim that he did so by tweeting, using paid influencers, and appearing on “Saturday Night Live” on May 8, 2021 all while using wallets controlled by himself or Tesla
The lawsuit also highlights Musk’s April sale of approximately $124 million worth of Dogecoin. The sale coincided with Musk’s replacement of Twitter’s logo with Dogecoin’s iconic Shiba Inu logo. The cryptocurrency spiked 30% shortly after the logo switch from $0.07705 to $0.10109.
Investors also say that Musk knowingly manipulated the market, engaged in insider trading, and deceived them while advancing his reputation and his companies’ interests.
At the time of writing, Dogecoin was trading at $0.06244, up by 6% in the last seven days.
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Edited by Daisy Atino and Virginia Van Zandt
