By
Bena Ilyas
April 25th, 2024
Elon Musk also reiterated his earlier position about Bitcoin as a store of value.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has yet again denied claims that he is Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin. He reiterated this at a podcast hosted by Lex Fridman on Wednesday, 29th December 2021.
Musk wields an unusual influence in the crypto space causing price swings at unprecedented rates by single tweets. The influence has fueled speculations that the billionaire may very well be Satoshi Nakamoto. In addition, Sahil Gupta, SpaceX, accused Elon Musk of being Satoshi Nakamoto in a Medium post in November 2017. Despite quelling the rumor, it never really went out of circulation.
When asked during the podcast interview to put to bed the rumor, Elon Musk outrightly denied the claim. He further stated that he would tell the world if he was the Bitcoin inventor.
Focus on the Evolution of Ideas, Not on the Fact Who Satoshi Nakamoto Is
The SpaceX founder went on to argue that the identity of the Bitcoin creator is not as important as the evolution of ideas that led to the cryptocurrency. Accordingly, he noted that Nick Szabo is the single most responsible person for the ideas behind Bitcoin.
Speaking about Szabo, Musk said:
“He claims not to be Nakamoto, but I’m not sure that’s neither here nor there. But he seems to be the one more responsible for the ideas behind bitcoin than anyone else.”
Musk’s conclusion is in line with that of some UK linguistic researchers in 2014. After studying the Bitcoin Whitepaper along with the writing of more than 11 creators including Nick Szabo, they concluded that Szabo had the best match.
“The number of linguistic similarities between Szabo’s writing and the bitcoin whitepaper is uncanny,” the researchers noted.
On his part, Szabo has also denied any claims he is Satoshi.
Bitcoin Is More of a Store of Value than a Currency, Says Elon Musk
Elon also reiterated his earlier position about Bitcoin as a store of value. Recall that after being named Time’s 2021 Person of the Year, Musk told the media that “fundamentally, Bitcoin is not a good substitute for transactional currency.” He noted it was more suitable as a store of value explaining why investors liked to hold on to it.
During the podcast interview, he added that Bitcoin was too deflationary to be a transactional currency. “When a currency is too deflationary and is expected to increase value over time, people prefer to HODL it instead of spending it,” added he.