By
Bena Ilyas
April 25th, 2024
Anthony Scaramucci said he’s willing to wager 500K Satoshis that, within a year, Tesla or Solar City will announce its entry into “super clean” bitcoin mining.
The electric automaker, Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) steered a new milestone in the cryptocurrency ecosystem back in February when it invested $1.5 billion in Bitcoin (BTC). The company, led by Elon Musk created a new utility for the first digital currency when it declared it has started accepting the cryptocurrency as payments for its cars back in March. While Tesla’s dive into Bitcoin gave the digital currency a massive face-lift, the company has announced it will stop accepting Bitcoin payments for its products. The reason cited for this move is that cryptocurrency consumes a lot of energy in the process of mining, making it highly environmentally unfriendly. However, there are talks that Tesla may enter clean Bitcoin mining in the near future.
“Tesla has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin,” Musk said in a statement posted on Twitter. “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. Cryptocurrency is a good idea on many levels and we believe it has a promising future, but this cannot come at great cost to the environment.”
The company however noted that it will not be selling off its BTC holdings and may still use Bitcoin for “transactions as soon as mining transitions to more sustainable energy.”
Bitcoin’s mining energy requirement has often generated a lot of concern, especially among BTC critics. While the energy consumption excuse Tesla cited was faulted by the crypto community on Twitter, the CEO justified his position by posting the cryptocurrency’s energy usage trend for the past few years.
Energy usage trend over past few months is insane https://t.co/E6o9s87trw pic.twitter.com/bmv9wotwKe
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 13, 2021
Crypto proponents argued that Fiat currencies such as the United States Dollar consume even more energy making the move questionable.
The price of Bitcoin slumped following the Tesla announcement and is currently trading at $49,767.43, down 11.82% in the past 24 hours according to CoinMarketCap.
Tesla Rescinds Bitcoin Payments: A Move to Dive into the Mining Ecosystem?
For many who seem to know how Elon Musk thinks, like Anthony Scaramucci, whose company, SkyBridge Capital runs its own Bitcoin Funds, there is an assumption that the tech guru is up to something with Tesla’s latest Bitcoin payments halt.
Scaramucci said he’s willing to wager 500K Satoshis that, within a year, Tesla or Solar City will be announcing its entry into “super clean” bitcoin mining.
Elon is not a half measures guy. I predict he will become a competitor/disruptor in the Bitcoin mining industry. I wager 500k sats that, within a year, Tesla/Solar City will announces its entry into “super clean” bitcoin mining.
— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) May 13, 2021
Scaramucci believes that Elon Musk is using the announcement as a publicity stunt to call for an eco-friendly mining option for Bitcoin, with the firm likely ready to take the lead in this regard.
Part of the reasons why many are surprised at Tesla and Elon’s move is because the CEO was recently revealed the firm was considering accepting Dogecoin as payments after Bitcoin and that SpaceX may also accept Dogecoin as payments in the near future. Worth noting that both Dogecoin and Bitcoin are mined in similar ways as they are secured using the Proof-of-Work consensus model, a fact Elon Musk must have been aware of.