Dog Go To The Moon

Dog Go To The Moon

Image: token logo via CoinGecko / DexScreener listings
ticker	DOG
blockchain	Bitcoin (Runes)
launched	April 2024
peak market cap	about 1 billion dollars (December 2024)

Dog Go To The Moon is the leading meme coin on the Bitcoin Runes protocol, etched at the April 2024 halving and airdropped free to Runestone holders, reaching a market capitalization of about 1 billion dollars in late 2024.

Dog Go To The Moon, written on chain as DOG GO TO THE MOON and traded as DOG, is a meme coin issued on Bitcoin through the Runes protocol. It launched at the April 2024 Bitcoin halving and became the flagship token of the Runes ecosystem, giving Bitcoin its first major native dog coin.

Origin

The Runes protocol, created by Ordinals inventor Casey Rodarmor, went live at the halving on April 20, 2024 and allowed fungible tokens on Bitcoin for the first time at scale. DOG's on chain identity is precise: it is rune 840000:3, the number 3 rune etched inside halving block 840000 on April 20, 2024 at 00:09 UTC, with the full 100 billion supply premined, minting disabled, a divisibility of 5, and the dog symbol; about 24.4 million DOG have since been provably burned. It was distributed entirely for free: the Runestone Ordinal that determined the airdrop, a project associated with the Ordinals historian known as Leonidas, had gone to over 112,000 early Ordinals wallets in March 2024, and every holder received an airdrop of 889,806 DOG on April 24, 2024. The project celebrates that the Runestone inscription filled what it calls the largest Bitcoin block ever recorded. The free and broad distribution, with no presale and no team allocation, became central to the token's identity.

Market history

Decrypt reported the token hit a market capitalization of about 336 million dollars within days of the airdrop, and CryptoBriefing recorded it passing 500 million dollars in its first 24 hours of trading. Early exchange support came fast for a Bitcoin native asset: Gate.io opened DOG trading on April 25, 2024, one day after the airdrop, and MEXC opened DOG/USDT spot trading on June 24, 2024. By June 2024 CoinDesk described DOG rocketing toward a 1 billion dollar capitalization after a 200 percent monthly surge. The all time high of about 0.0099 dollars came in early December 2024, putting the capitalization at roughly 999 million dollars.

Kraken listed DOG perpetual futures on November 14, 2024, and the price jumped over 30 percent within hours; that month Decrypt reported DOG hitting a five month high amid Dogecoin hype and listing speculation. On June 27, 2025 Kraken opened spot trading for DOG, the first Bitcoin Runes asset it ever listed, a milestone the DOG army treated as institutional validation of Runes. Binance never listed DOG, and it became an open grievance: on October 15, 2025 Leonidas publicly accused the exchange, writing that DOG "reached a billion dollar market cap and was on the homepage of @CoinMarketCap" while Binance "would not even give it a perp listing" as it spot listed what he called insider controlled meme coins, ending "CZ is lying to our faces," an accusation by Leonidas that Binance did not publicly answer. Bridged versions of DOG spread beyond Bitcoin, including a bridged DOG on Merlin Chain tracked by Bybit, part of the push to make the rune tradable in EVM and Solana venues. The token remained the largest rune by value, with listings across Kraken, Bybit, OKX, KuCoin, Gate.io, Magic Eden and more than a dozen other venues, though by August 2026 its capitalization had retraced to around 63 million dollars.

Cultural impact

DOG's community, the self styled DOG army, marketed the token as the number one meme coin on Bitcoin and pushed the narrative that the oldest blockchain deserved its own Dogecoin. Its airdrop model was held up in the trenches as the fair distribution counterpoint to the pump.fun launch meta on Solana, and its trajectory effectively defined the Runes asset class: it proved the protocol could host a billion dollar asset, and its later decline tracked the broader fade of Runes speculation. Leonidas remains the community's standard bearer deep into the decline, with his X identity still reading "$DOG maximalist" to about 240 thousand followers, and in October 2025 he was still telling followers it was a "Good reminder to buy the $DOG dip!"

References

• Decrypt: https://decrypt.co/227953/bitcoin-meme-coin-dog-336-million-market-cap-runes-airdrop
• CoinDesk: https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2024/06/04/bitcoin-based-meme-coin-dog-rockets-toward-1b-market-cap
• Crypto Briefing: https://cryptobriefing.com/dog-token-market-cap-500m/
• CoinGecko: https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/dog-go-to-the-moon-runes-2
• Benzinga: https://www.benzinga.com/markets/cryptocurrency/24/06/39151241/dog-go-to-the-moon-a-bitcoin-based-memecoin-outperformed-the-broader-market-with-25-gain-f
• ordinals.com: https://ordinals.com/rune/DOG%E2%80%A2GO%E2%80%A2TO%E2%80%A2THE%E2%80%A2MOON
• doggotothemoon.io: https://doggotothemoon.io/
• tekedia.com: https://www.tekedia.com/krakens-potential-dog-listing-could-drive-significant-price-momentum/
• Cryptonews: https://cryptonews.com/news/crypto-exchange-listing-and-delisting-announcements-june-10-2024/
• MEXC: https://www.mexc.com/es/support/articles/17827791516848
• elitecity.io: https://elitecity.io/dog-runes-skyrockets-after-kraken-futures-announcement-whats-driving-the-surge/
• Decrypt: https://decrypt.co/292045/bitcoin-native-meme-coin-dog-jumps-to-5-month-high-amid-dogecoin-hype-exchange-listing-hope
• Kraken: https://blog.kraken.com/product/asset-listings/dog-is-available-for-trading
• X post by @LeonidasNFT: https://x.com/LeonidasNFT/status/1978455293496340502
• Bybit Learn: https://www.bybit.com/en/price/bridged-dog-go-to-the-moon/
• X post by @LeonidasNFT: https://x.com/LeonidasNFT/status/1976790061158980962
• X post by @LeonidasNFT: https://x.com/LeonidasNFT/status/1976790061128814597