 
 
Dogecoin’s journey from being a fun memecoin to garnering popularity from the likes of SpaceX/Tesla boss Elon Musk is cementing itself into the mainstream as Grayscale’s GDOG ETF started trading on NYSE Arca on Monday with a zero-fee structure for its first $1 billion, marking the first U.S.-listed spot DOGE exchange-traded fund (ETF).
However, debut trading volume for the much-anticipated DOGE product came in drastically lower than expected by pundits.
Grayscale’s GDOG Underwhelming Debut
Bloomberg’s senior ETF analyst noted that GDOG recorded $1.41 million in day-one trading volume but no net inflows, marking a much quieter start than his initial volume estimation of $12 million in debut trading.
“Solid for an average launch but low for a ‘first-ever spot’ product,” Balchunas wrote in a post on X. “Not too surprising [though], we actually made a rhyme a while ago predicting this: ‘The further away you get from BTC, the less asset there will be.’”
Dogecoin is the 10th biggest crypto by market cap at $22.8 billion, according to crypto data provider CoinGecko. The coin started as a meme featuring the Shiba Inu dog that later caught Musk’s attention as the centibillionaire frequently posted about the OG memecoin.
 
The muted launch for GDOG pales in comparison to recently listed ETFs tracking the prices of Solana and XRP. Earlier this month, Canary Capital’s spot XRP fund (XRPC) raked in roughly $58 million in trading volume, the strongest debut of any ETF launched this year.
Canary’s XRPC even surpassed the Solana staking ETF from Bitwise — which registered approximately $57 million in trading volume on day one in October.
Grayscale’s GDOG is now the second to list in the U.S. following the debut of the REX-Osprey DOGE ETF in September. That one took a different approach since it is registered under the Investment Company Act of 1940, which provides a 75-day approval window, but does not directly hold the cryptocurrency.
Another Dogecoin ETF is expected to hit the market soon, after NYSE Arca filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Tuesday to certify its approval and listing of Bitwise’s Dogecoin ETF (BWOW), which Bitwise announced would start trading on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, DOGE’s price is trading just around $0.1502, over 79% from its all-time high of $0.7316, according to CoinGecko. Over the last seven days, the altcoin has witnessed a decline of over 5%, exacerbated by the broader crypto market correction that started in October.