Elon Musk seeks to end $258 billion Dogecoin lawsuit

Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, is looking to have a $258 billion lawsuit dismissed by U.S. judge accusing him of running a pyramid scheme to support cryptocurrency Dogecoin. The lawsuit is claimed by Dogecoin investors, which Musk and Tesla have branded as a “a fanciful work of fiction” over Musk’s “innocuous and often silly tweets” about Dogecoin. According to Musk’s lawyers, the allegations against him are too vague to be accepted and investors never described how he intended to defraud anyone or what risks he concealed.

Dogecoin investors alleged that Musk significantly raised Dogecoin’s price by more than 36,000% over two years with the intention of crashing it. They are claiming that he made billions of dollars of profit while other investors suffered, even though Musk knew that Dogecoin had no intrinsic value. Investors also emphasized Musk’s appearance on the “Weekend Update” NBC’s Saturday Night Live. He appeared as a fictitious financial expert, calling Dogecoin “a hustle.”

The lawsuit is also challenging the Dogecoin Foundation, a non-profit organization, and demanding its dismissal. Investors have previously filed multiple lawsuits against Musk over his Twitter posts, prompting serious concerns.

Musk won a significant court victory on February 3, 2023, in San Francisco, when a jury found him not liable for tweeting on August 2018 that he had arranged financing to take Tesla private. The case is in the Johnson et al v. Musk et al, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York.

By Jonathan Stempel, Editing by William Mallard.