While the ongoing volatile crypto market has decimated portfolios across the board, early backers of meme coin Shiba Inu are still counting their blessings despite the brutal decline. Investors who took a chance on the fledgling token in its first year have managed to hold onto millionaire status even as SHIB currently trades 89% below its peak.. Changelly data shows that a hypothetical investment of just $1000 made in August 2020, near the launch of the previously unknown Shiba Inu, is now worth a staggering $9 million. That equates to a 907599.52% return on investment over the span of three and a half years.. Such outsized gains elevated SHIB into a millionaire-making juggernaut during its gravity-defying rally in 2021. Its early backers hit a liquidity jackpot, the likes of which are rarely seen from single crypto assets.. Also read: Shiba Inu: What Could a $1,000 SHIB Investment Yield in 2025?. Stories have surfaced about teachers, Uber drivers, and employees who managed to scrape together some cash to purchase SHIB tokens when they were trading for a tiny fraction of a penny, only to find themselves sitting atop a mountain of cash less than a year later.. Source: Changelly. Nearly all cashed out a portion of their holdings when SHIB went on its parabolic run-up to an all-time high of $0.00008816 in late October 2021. That helped them realize life-changing money despite having invested comparably tiny sums just months earlier.. Also read: Shiba Inu: Google Bard Predicts SHIB Price If Bitcoin Touches $500,000. To be sure, with SHIB having crashed 89% from those record levels, early investor portfolios are not worth nearly as much today as they were in late 2021. However, those who have held on have still achieved once-in-a-lifetime returns that massively outstrip gains seen in stocks, bonds, and even Bitcoin over the same timeframe.. As of press time, Shiba Inu is trading at $0.00000948, with no major movements in the last 24 hours, according to CoinMarketCap data.