Last month, Tesla customers got an opportunity to purchase select merchandise from its online shop using Dogecoin. It was a trial run, but apparently, it has been successful. Therefore, Tesla is expanding its crypto payments.
Dogecoin (DOGE) has been the favorite cryptocurrency of Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) CEO Elon Musk for a long time. Therefore, it’s not a big surprise that now Tesla supports Dogecoin as a payment method at one of its supercharging stations. In particular, supercharging station at Santa Monica will be the first one to accept DOGE.
Elon Musk revealed the news on his Twitter when replying to the founder of Tesla Console Ryan Zohoury on his message about extremely busy operations immediately after opening.
And, of course, you can pay in Ðoge
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 19, 2022
Elon Musk has not shared any other details regarding what exactly customers can pay for with DOGE. Therefore, we can only make suggestions. And it’s not that difficult considering previous statements made by Tesla CEO about Dogecoin and its intentions to accept it as payment.
Back in December 2021, Elon Musk first said that the EV maker would start accepting the crypto as payment for its merchandise. Last month, we reported that Tesla customers got an opportunity to purchase select merchandise from its online shop using Dogecoin. It was a trial run, but apparently, it has been successful. Therefore, Tesla will expand its crypto payments.
Initially, Musk was supporting Bitcoin. But later, he changed his mind in favor of DOGE. He said:
“The transaction value of Bitcoin is low and the cost per transaction is high. At least at a space level, it is suitable as a store of value. But fundamentally, Bitcoin is not a good substitute for transactional currency.”
Notably, being an advocate of Dogecoin, Musk does not believe that cryptocurrencies can fully replace fiat currencies. However, he considers DOGE as the dominating coin in the crypto payments space due to its inflationary nature. According to Musk, this is the feature that will encourage people to spend the asset rather than hold it.
DOGE Price Fluctuations amid News on Payment Methods Offered by Tesla
Every time following the news about Tesla and Dogecoin, the price of the currency is going up. The latest initiative at the supercharging station is not an exception. At the time of Musk’s tweet, DOGE was trading at $0.1417. Then, the price went up to $0.1450 but fell back to below the $0.140 level. As of the press moment, DOGE is trading at $0.1398. Its market cap totals $18,552 billion.
Speaking of the DOGE price forecast, some experts anticipate that the coin will continue the upward movement to hit the $1 mark by mid-2022. Others expect the price to go as high as $1.5 in the next five years. In 2021, the coin benefited from broad institutional adoption as a payment option. We can expect the same to continue in 2022, with more retailer shops and exchanges endorsing DOGE.
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