The Rise of Shiba Inu Coin Shows Crypto’s New Dynamics

Much of the cryptocurrency world can feel like an inside joke. One coin that has become prominent in the past month seems even more obscure—like an inside joke about an inside joke.

Shiba Inu coin, created in August 2020 by an anonymous person calling themselves Ryoshi, is billed as an alternative to Dogecoin, which itself was created as a lighthearted option to Bitcoin. Shiba Inu feels as if it was willed into existence, and is now being listed on major crypto exchanges through the power of memes, crowds, persistence—and a cute dog.

A website that hosts the coin’s white paper (or rather Woof Paper) calls it “an experiment in decentralised spontaneous community building.” Shiba Inu is built on top of the Ethereum blockchain, like many other coins. By design, each one is worth a minuscule amount—$0.0000078 on Thursday.

It’s like Dogecoin on reverse steroids (each Dogecoin is worth 30 cents, which seems wildly expensive by comparison). The cheaper the coin, the larger the potential community. The market cap of Shiba coin is now about $3 billion, but it climbed over $10 billion last month. It’s the 32nd most valuable cryptocurrency, according to coinmarket.com.

The Woof Paper includes philosophical claims about decentralization that are common in the crypto world—that money and transactions should have no gatekeepers. And, like Dogecoin, it has taken the Shiba Inu—a dog breed from Japan—as its mascot. One tenet of the coin is that the community loves the dogs. Also, it has embraced the title of “Dogecoin killer”.

The founders even gifted 50 trillion of the coins, worth $1 billion at the time, to Ethereum co-creator Vitalik Buterin, who quickly got rid of it by transferring it to a Covid relief fund for India—at which point, Shiba Inu coin briefly plunged 50%.

If this all feels like a trip into a bizarre new world, it’s also shining a spotlight on an emerging trend in crypto and stock-trading. The Shiba website says the community is 520,000 strong and growing, expanding its reach as its memes and philosophy spread on social media. Meanwhile, the crypto world’s gatekeepers are anxious to bring in new users and volume as Bitcoin trading has been relatively weak in recent weeks. Shiba Inu has been listed on major exchanges like Binance.

On Tuesday, Coinbase Global (ticker: COIN) said it would list the coin on its Coinbase Pro platform—generally a precursor for it to be listed for all retail Coinbase users. In addition, Shiba fans started a petition to try to convince brokerage app Robinhood to list Shiba Inu coin. As of Thursday, it had 156,000 signatures.

A Robinhood spokesperson said the company had no comment on the petition. In a previous Reddit discussion, Robinhood Crypto Chief Operating Officer Christine Brown wrote, “We’re always looking into which coins to add to Robinhood Crypto, but for security and compliance reasons we can’t talk about which ones we’re looking into adding.”

There has already been a glitch in Coinbase’s adoption of Shiba Inu coin. It was supposed to start trading on Thursday, but “technical issues” have delayed the launch. Users can withdraw Shiba but can’t deposit it, according to a Coinbase spokesperson. “We will provide an updated timeline for restoring deposits & enabling trading as soon as possible,” she wrote. She did not respond to a follow-up question on what technical issues were causing the problems.

In recent years, Coinbase has been seen as an important gatekeeper in the crypto universe, and coins have tended to spike in value when they get listed on the platform. On Tuesday, Shiba Inu coin jumped more than 30% after the announcement.

Asked about why Coinbase listed Shiba Inu coin, the spokesperson wrote that “we want to be the Amazon of crypto where people can find and buy the assets they want and as part of this, our aim is to list every legally permissible asset possible.”

In its latest earnings report, Coinbase said that the company was concerned about customers going to other platforms if Coinbase doesn’t offer certain coins. It quickly listed Dogecoin after the earnings call, and has been expediting the listing process, giving coin-creators and users new ways to apply for listings. The company says it’s still holding on to high standards for the new coins, however.

“We are confident that based on the information we have access to, that assets available on our platform are appropriate for retail customers,” the spokesperson wrote.

As their strategies shift and they list more coins, the exchanges are likely to become less important gatekeepers in the crypto world, according to Matt Hougan, chief investment officer of crypto fund provider Bitwise Asset Management.

“The days when Coinbase adding an asset to its platform was an implicit stamp of approval are over,” he wrote in an email to Barron’s. It should now be thought of as a platform that “will trade anything that meets its listing standards.”

In general, that’s a good thing. In the traditional investing world, brokers like Charles Schwab (SCHW) play a similar role—offering access, but not necessarily approval. “You can buy some amazing stocks on Schwab, and you can buy some absolute dogs (no pun intended),” Hougan wrote. “We don’t assume Schwab is evaluating the investment merit of every stock that trades on its platform.”

Given the shift, however, it’s even more important for investors to “do your own homework and know what you’re buying, or you should turn to professional crypto asset managers to evaluate exposures for you.”

Family offices are increasingly asserting their dominance in Australia’s private credit markets, particularly in the commercial real estate debt (CRED) segment.

With more than 2,000 family offices now operating nationally—an increase of over 150% in the past decade, according to KPMG—their influence is not only growing in scale, but also in strategic sophistication.

Traditionally focused on preserving intergenerational wealth, COI Capital has found that family offices have broadened their mandates to include more active and yield-driven deployment of capital, particularly through private credit vehicles.

This shift is underpinned by a defensive allocation rationale: enhanced risk-adjusted returns, predictable income, and collateral-backed structures offer an attractive alternative to the volatility of public markets.

The Competitive Landscape for Manager Mandates

As family offices increase their exposure to private credit, the dynamic between managers and capital providers is evolving. Family offices are highly discerning capital allocators.

They expect enhanced reporting, real-time visibility into asset performance, and access to decision-makers are key differentiators for successful managers. Co-investment rights, performance-based fees, and downside protection mechanisms are increasingly standard features.

While typically fee-sensitive, many family offices are willing to accept standard management and performance fee structures when allocating $5M+ tickets, recognising the sourcing advantage and risk oversight provided by experienced managers. This has created a tiered market where only managers with demonstrated execution capability, origination networks, and robust governance frameworks are considered suitable partners.

Notably, many are competing by offering differentiated access models, such as segregated mandates, debt tranches, or tailored securitisation vehicles.

Onshore vs. Offshore Family Offices

There are important distinctions between onshore and offshore family offices in the context of CRED participation:

Onshore Family Offices: Typically have deep relationships with local stakeholders (brokers, valuers, developers) and a more intuitive understanding of planning, legal, and enforcement frameworks in Australian real estate markets. They are more likely to engage directly or via specialised mandates with domestic managers.
Offshore Family Offices: While often attracted to the yield premium and legal protections offered in Australia, they face structural barriers in accessing deal flow. Currency risk, tax treatment, and regulatory unfamiliarity are key concerns. However, they bring diversification and scale, often via feeder vehicles, special-purpose structures, or syndicated participation with Tier 1 managers.

COI Capital Management has both an offshore and onshore strategy to assist and suit both distinct Family Office needs.

Impact on the Broader CRED Market

The influx of family office capital into private credit markets has several systemic implications:

Family offices, deploying capital in significant tranches, have enhanced liquidity across the mid-market CRE sector.
Their ability to move quickly with minimal conditionality has contributed to yield compression, particularly on low-LVR, income-producing assets.
As a few family offices dominate large allocations, concerns emerge around pricing power, governance, and systemic concentration risk.

Unlike ADIs or superannuation funds, family offices operate outside the core prudential framework, raising transparency and risk management questions, particularly in a stress scenario.

So what is the answer? Are Family Offices the most Attractive?

Yes—family offices are arguably among the most attractive funding partners for CRED managers today. Their capital is not only flexible and long-term focused, but also often deployed with a strategic mindset.

Many family offices now have a deep understanding of the risk-return profile of CRE debt, making them highly engaged and informed investors.

They’re typically open to co-investment, bespoke structuring, and are less bogged down by institutional red tape, allowing them to move quickly and decisively when the right opportunity presents itself. For managers, this combination of agility, scale, and sophistication makes them a valuable and increasingly sought-after partner in the private credit space.

For high-performing CRED managers with demonstrable origination, governance, and reporting frameworks, family offices offer not only a reliable source of capital but also a collaborative partnership model capable of supporting large-scale deployments across market cycles.

Faris Dedic is the Founder and Managing Director of DIG Capital Advisory and COI Capital Management

The Rise of Shiba Inu Coin Shows Crypto’s New Dynamics

One coin that has become prominent in the past month seems even more obscure.

As Australia’s family offices expand their presence in private credit, a growing number of commercial real estate debt (CRED) managers are turning to them as flexible, strategic funding partners.

The Competitive Landscape for Manager Mandates

Onshore vs. Offshore Family Offices

Impact on the Broader CRED Market

So what is the answer? Are Family Offices the most Attractive?