Key points to remember
- DOGE investors have filed a third amended lawsuit in their class action lawsuit against Elon Musk.
- The complaint includes market manipulation due to tweets, insider trading and calling DOGE a security.
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Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and owner of Twitter, received a third amended complaint in his class action lawsuit, which present new allegations centered on DOGE manipulation and insider trading.
According to the investors’ filing with the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York on May 31, Musk leveraged his extensive social media presence on Twitter and leveraged his media appearances to capitalize on the transactions involving DOGE. They claim that his actions “savagely manipulated the Dogecoin cryptocurrency market,” resulting in personal gains while negatively impacting other investors.
The complaint specifically points to Musk’s use of Twitter, where he shared tweets and changed the platform’s logo to the Dogecoin logo. These actions would have triggered significant price spikes in the token, benefiting Musk’s positions at the expense of other investors:
“After this case was filed, Musk tweeted to his 100 million followers, “I will continue to support Dogecoin,” and the next business day after filing a motion to dismiss the current case, Musk changed the Twitter blue bird logo in Dogecoin Shiba Inu. logo for three days, driving up the price of Dogecoin by 30%.”
THE the original lawsuit was filed in June 2022, before Musk assumed the role of CEO of Twitter, but has since undergone several changes to reflect his later actions. The third amended filing stated that the investors sought to include allegations of insider trading by Musk and argued that Dogecoin should be classified as a security under United States Securities and Exchange Commission regulations, with the filing stating:
“Buying and selling Dogecoin is a transaction or scheme involving the issuance of virtual Dogecoin units (“tokens” or “coins”) to participants in exchange for an investment of money.”
The amended lawsuit calls the situation a class action for securities fraud, accusing Musk of “hijack (hijack) an emerging pop culture phenomenon to promote themselves and their businesses. Investors said Musk took advantage of the “the sincere hopes of vulnerable Americansincluding veterans, blue-collar workers and the elderly, while building his already inflated wealth.
Musk uses his Twitter platform, which has millions of followers, to express his thoughts on DOGE. Here is his first tweet about DOGE in 2019:
Dogecoin might be my favorite cryptocurrency. It’s really cool.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 2, 2019