Shiba Inu's lead developer, Shytoshi Kusama, addressed the potential to execute a significant burn of 99% of the circulating SHIB token supply. This undertaking, while ambitious, is believed to be achievable through concerted efforts and strategic planning. Kusama has opened the floor to the community's inquiries, inviting questions for his podcast with the prompt, “What a topic or question you want to hear answered on my podcast? #shyspeaks.”
Kusama’s engagement set the foundation for discussing the extensive token burn strategy. Fang Zhang, the Chief Financial Officer at LSP Finance, inquired about the practical implementation of such a large-scale burn, specifically asking for details on the timeline and roadmap. Kusama acknowledged the challenges of achieving this goal, suggesting that although burning 99% of SHIB seemed unattainable years ago, collective efforts from multiple projects might now make it possible.
For this outcome, Kusama underlined the necessity of widespread adoption of the Shib tech stack, especially by large-scale projects.
He explained that if the burning process accelerates, it could inadvertently increase SHIB's price, complicating and slowing the burn due to rising costs. “Assuming things started spiraling to a huge burn, people will buy considering that the price will moon. In this case, it would be more expensive to burn Shib, slowing down burning,” Kusama explained.
Moreover, Kusama highlighted that the strategic intent is equally critical as the burn itself. “It’s not the burning that matters, it’s [the] intention,” he stated. He also argued that token burns are not the only way to meet SHIB’s objectives. Enhancing the meme token's utility is equally crucial, with strategies that include staking and developing use cases for related tokens like BONE, LEASH, and Treat.
The proposed burn aims to induce scarcity, potentially raising each SHIB token's value if demand remains constant or rises. Such a shift could transform SHIB from a low-cost meme token into a more valuable asset. Nonetheless, Kusama emphasized that the burn is a long-term process contingent on the widespread integration of SHIB’s technology, likely unfolding over several years.
Currently, SHIB is attempting to surpass the 0.5 Fibonacci retracement level at $0.00002823, derived from its March high of $0.00004567 and August's local low of $0.00001067. A successful breakout above this level might lead to advancing towards the 0.618 Fibonacci target at $0.00003235 in the short term.