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Forbes contributor and active crypto community member @pete_rizzo_ has published a tweet about Elon Musk and Bitcoin to remind Crypto Twitter that exactly three years ago, the tech mogul and centibillionaire announced his support for Bitcoin in public for the first time.
Historic day for Bitcoin
Back on that day, Feb. 1, 2021, Elon Musk said in an interview on social app Clubhouse that he supports Bitcoin. The tech billionaire and innovator added that he should have bought some of the world’s flagship cryptocurrency eight years before – in 2013.
He stated: “I do at this point think Bitcoin is a good thing. I’m late to the party, but I am a supporter of Bitcoin.” After he made his Bitcoin-supporting statement, the price of this digital asset soared by more than $1,000 and exceeded $34,500.
Musk also shared that he did not have any strong views of other cryptos, clarifying that his Dogecoin-themed tweets were meant to be nothing but jokes. As for Bitcoin, Musk said he believed it was about to become accepted by big players from the traditional financial sphere.
Tesla begins accepting Bitcoin for a while
What followed was that soon after that, Tesla e-car giant announced on Twitter that it started to accept the leading cryptocurrency as payment, and it also acquired a whopping $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin to put on its balance sheet.
This pushed Bitcoin into the $58,700 zone in early April, making it a new all-time high for BTC. However, a short while after that, Tesla made a U-turn as Musk suspended Bitcoin payments for e-cars. He motivated this step by saying that Bitcoin proof-of-work-based mining was damaging to the environment and offered miners the chance to start using renewable energy sources.
Musk said that Tesla will resume taking Bitcoin as soon as BTC mining becomes more than 50% based on green energy. This balance, according to Bitcoin evangelist Michael Saylor was reached in the same year of 2021, however, Tesla still has not reactivated Bitcoin payments and has been gradually selling Bitcoin from its balance sheet.
Still, in 2022, Musk confessed that among the cryptocurrencies he holds is Bitcoin, aside from Ethereum and Dogecoin.
Arman Shirinyan
Alex Dovbnya
