invezz.com
Business magnate Elon Musk has disclosed that both Tesla and SpaceX have Bitcoin holdings. He unveiled this news during the B Word conference, in which Twitter’s CEO, Jack Dorsey, and ARK Invest’s CEO, Cathie Wood, also featured.
In the conference, Musk said he supports cryptocurrencies although he is skeptical towards Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus mechanisms. Musk, who claims Tesla is the only public stock in his portfolio, further noted that he owns three assets. These are Bitcoin (BTC/USD), Ethereum (ETH/USD), and Dogecoin (DOGE/USD).
Are you looking for fast-news, hot-tips and market analysis? Sign-up for the Invezz newsletter, today.
While he did not share how much his crypto wealth is worth, Musk said his BTC holdings exceed ETH and DOGE by a large margin. This disclosure comes after Musk announced that Tesla had purchased $1.5 billion (£1.09 billion) worth of BTC in February this year. The news of SpaceX holding BTC is, however, new. Explaining why he never revealed that the space exploration company had dabbled in crypto, Musk said SpaceX is a private firm.
Like his personal crypto wealth, Musk did not share how much BTC SpaceX holds. However, he hinted that the company could get more involved with the crypto space.
Tesla still won’t accept BTC until it taps into renewable energy sources
Although he claims BTC cannot be the monetary system of the world at the base layer, Musk believes the leading cryptocurrency can achieve this feat at the second layer depending on its implementation. He added that SpaceX is playing a role in helping BTC achieve this vision. However, he did not specify the steps the company is taking in this direction.
Musk recapped that Tesla does not intend to start accepting BTC once again until the coin’s miners start using renewable energy sources. Explaining that Tesla is not looking for perfection, Musk said BTC’s energy does not have to be pure like the driven snow. However, it can’t be sourced from the world’s dirtiest coal. According to him, BTC mining must use 50% renewable energy before the electric vehicle manufacture can go back to accepting the cryptocurrency for payments.
However, instead of just pinpointing the pain points of BTC and leaving the community to resolve them, Musk said Tesla can help BTC mitigate the effect it has on the environment. He noted that the company has solar solutions and strong connections in the renewables industry. The 50-year-entrepreneur also touted nuclear energy produced through fission, saying nuclear plants are safe regardless of public opinion.