Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, has suggested that the crypto sector is heading toward a greener ecosystem, but Tesla will not take Bitcoin payments for the time being. Musk said during “The Word,” an online Bitcoin (BTC) conference with Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, Ark Invest’s Cathie Wood, and panelist Steve Lee from Square Crypto, that Tesla would “most probably” look at the option of accepting crypto payments for its automobiles — a policy the CEO ended in May — but that he deemed necessary to do his homework first.
“There looks to be a positive development with respect to Bitcoin’s power consumption,” Musk remarked, while also voicing doubt about the network’s rapid transition to renewable energy sources. “With renewables, there’s really no way to effectively double or treble the quantity of electricity in a very short span of time […]. Tesla’s aim is to accelerate the development of renewable energy. We do not wish to fall in the category of accepting claims without doing proper research on Bitcoin’s power consumption.”
“It appears that Bitcoin is turning a lot further towards renewable energy sources, and a considerable portion of the large coal-based power producing facilities that were indisputably being utilized, particularly in China, have been closed down,” he continued. I’d want to perform some further research to validate that the proportion of renewable power consumption is most probably at or over 50%, and that there is a tendency toward boosting that proportion. If that is the case, Tesla will reintroduce Bitcoin as a payment option.”
Due to the network’s “increasingly fast usage of non-renewable fossil fuels,” Musk stated in May that Tesla will no longer take Bitcoin payments. The crypto asset’s value then dropped below $40,000 for the foremost time since February. Tesla CEO Elon Musk subsequently stated that the business will reinstate BTC payments if miners were confirmed to be utilizing over 50% renewable energy “with a favorable future trend.” Musk also refuted accusations that he was running a pump-and-dump strategy using twitter posts about cryptocurrencies such As bitcoin and Dogecoin (DOGE).
He also said BTC, DOGE, and Ether (ETH) have been the only three assets “of any relevance” he had out of the SpaceX and Tesla shares, and that neither he nor Tesla had liquidated any Bitcoin since the statement prohibiting crypto payments.
Tesla & Bitcoin pic.twitter.com/YSswJmVZhP
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 12, 2021
“I make a loss if the value of Bitcoin falls,” Musk stated, adding, “I would perhaps pump, but I wouldn’t dump. I don’t believe in inflating the price and then selling it or something like that.” Musk revealed in April that Tesla had liquidated a percentage of its Bitcoin assets — at a net profit of $272 million at the time — in order to demonstrate the asset’s viability as a cash substitute. He hasn’t specified the quantum of the cryptocurrency he holds personally, but he did say that his son – aged one – had some Dogecoin.
