The original meme token Dogecoin (DOGE -0.33%) launched toward the end of 2013, largely as a joke about cryptocurrencies, leveraging the Shiba Inu dog as its mascot. Today, Dogecoin is the eighth-largest cryptocurrency in the world with a market cap over $37 billion as of Sept. 24. If you'd invested $500 in Dogecoin five years agoFrom a fundamental perspective, it doesn't make a ton of sense why Dogecoin has delivered such incredible gains over the past five years, but it has. As you can see, a $500 investment in Dogecoin five years ago would be worth over $44,000 today! That's a return of more than 8,730%, which crushes the broader benchmark S&P 500 index's five-year return of over 100%.