According to CoinGecko data, Stellar (XLM) has managed to surpass Shiba Inu (SHIB) by market cap following a massive rally.
The token is up by a whopping 190% over the past week, with its market cap swelling to $17.3 billion. The token is also up 600% over the past three weeks.
For comparison, SHIB is currently valued at $15.7 billion after a relatively modest 9% price increase.
XLM is now on the cusp of entering the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization.
This would be a remarkable achievement for the O.G. altcoin, which is normally off the radar for most market participants.
XLM is the native token of the Stellar blockchain protocol, which was co-created by Ripple co-founder Jed McCaleb.
XRP, the Ripple-affiliated token, and XLM often tend to trade in lockstep.
Earlier this week, the price of XRP experienced a sharp rally, surging to a multi-year high of $1.6 after SEC Chair Gary Gensler announced his upcoming resignation.
A few months ago, Ripple CTO David Schwartz admitted that he had no idea what was causing this price correlation.
"I genuinely don't know. The thing that I think is most likely is that both prices are driven primarily by factors completely outside their ecosystems," Schwartz said.
Schwartz previously suggested that both XLM and XRP are being put in the same mental bucket due to their history. "I don't believe some kind of manipulation or evil force is somehow making them track. That seems kind of crazy to me," he added.
Yet, it remains to be seen whether these prominent tokens will manage to maintain their momentum beyond these short-term price spikes.
XRP, for instance, is still down nearly 60% from its record high.
Arman Shirinyan
Dan Burgin