Earlier this week Tesla founder Elon Musk has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin due to climate change concerns. Bitcoin fell by more than 10% after the tweet, while Tesla shares also dipped. There is also an overall DIP in the crypto market after his announcement.
Elon posted a tweet saying “We are concerned about rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for Bitcoin mining and transactions, especially coal, which has the worst emissions of any fuel”.
Tesla had earlier announced in March that it would accept bitcoin as a payment option for vehicle purchase. The electric carmaker had also revealed it had bought $1.5 billion of the world’s biggest digital currency.
Musk has been one of the world’s most high-profile proponents of cryptocurrencies, often tweeting about Bitcoin and the once-obscure digital currency Dogecoin. His tweets in recent months helped to turn Dogecoin (DOGE), which was started as a social media joke, into the world’s fourth-biggest cryptocurrency.
Market analysts see the move as an attempt by Tesla’s CEO to assuage the concerns of investors who are focused on climate change and sustainability.
Julia Lee from Burman Invest told the BBC that “Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance (ESG)” issues are now a major motivation for many investors. Tesla, being a clean energy-focused company, might want to work better in the environmental area of ESG.
“But a cynic might suggest that this is just another move by Elon Musk to influence the cryptocurrency market, as he has done on so many other occasions,”
This announcement has divided technoking and dogefather Elon musk with the rest of the crypto community. People all around the world are questioning him on Tesla’s and his other venture’s abuse of energy and CO2 emission.
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban says his NBA franchise will continue to accept Bitcoin as payment despite Elon Musk’s recent announcement that Tesla will not. Cuban tells his 8.4 million Twitter followers that, as a store of value, BTC is in fact a better environmental alternative to gold.
One pissed group of people even created a website and bogus token called FUCKELON.
Bitcoin enthusiasts insist that mining mainly involves renewable energy - in truth, the miners focus on whatever is cheapest, and in China, where many of them are based, that is often electricity generated by coal.
People have already started canceling their Tesla car and truck orders. Tesla shares also fell down and had seen a loss of $300 million worth of damage after this. A piece of recent news is coming from a popular bitcoin community on subreddit grouping for a worldwide complete boycott of Tesla cars.
