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22/07/2021

Elon Musk Says Tesla 'Most Likely' To Restart Accepting Bitcoin For Car Purchases




Elon Musk Says Tesla 'Most Likely' To Restart Accepting Bitcoin For Car Purchases
United States based electric car maker Tesla will conduct due diligence to make an assessment of the amount of renewable energy that would be used to mine bitcoin and then will most likely restart accepting the cryptocurrency as payment for its cars, said  the company’s Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk at a conference.
 
After dropping to less than $30,000 last week, bitcoin surged by 8 per cent on Wednesday to touch $32,160.16, while there was a 11.6 per cent rise in the value of another cryptocurrency ether to $1,993.36 after Musk’s comments.
 
In March this year, Musk had announced that Tesla would start accepting bitcoin, the biggest digital currency of the world, as payment for its cars. Then in May, Tesla said it would stop accepting the digital currency as payments for car purchases.
 
The latest comments on bitcoin were made by Musk at the B Word conference.
 
"I wanted a little bit more due diligence to confirm that the percentage of renewable energy usage is most likely at or above 50%, and that there is a trend towards increasing that number, and if so Tesla would resume accepting bitcoin" Musk said.
 
"Most likely the answer is that Tesla would resume accepting bitcoin," he added.
 
The decision of Tesla and Musk to accept bitcoin as a mode of payment for its vehicles was a dichotomy of sorts as Musk is known as an environmentalist and it was musk himself who made use of his popularity and stature as one of the richest people of the world to come out in support of cryptocurrencies whose mining is known to use up large amounts of electricity – thereby contributing to carbon emissions. This was also a concern for some Tesla investors as well as environmentalists who have been critical of the energy used up in bitcoin mining.
 
However, a greater number of digital currency miners are trying to make use of renewable energy sources for digital currency mining to address the concerns of the impact on environment from their crypto mining activities.
 
"Tesla's mission is accelerating the advent of sustainable energy. We can't be the company that does that and also not do appropriate diligence on the energy usage of bitcoin," Musk said.
 
In addition to the bitcoin that is owned by Tesla and SpaceX, Musk personally owned bitcoin, ethereum and dogecoin, the billionaire CEO said.
 
"I might pump, but I don't dump," Musk said. "I definitely do not believe in getting the price high and selling ... I would like to see bitcoin succeed."
 
(Source:www.ndtv.com)

Christopher J. Mitchell

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