[HN Gopher] Tesla has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin
___________________________________________________________________
 
Tesla has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin
 
Author : seigando
Score  : 85 points
Date   : 2021-05-12 22:13 UTC (47 minutes ago)
 
web link (twitter.com)
w3m dump (twitter.com)
 
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Hah! Many layers of hypocrisy here, heh, but at least this is a
| better place to end p. I hope this triggers a sell off.
 
  | adamhearn wrote:
  | Why do you hope for a sell off?
 
| paulpauper wrote:
| BTC still dropping even 30 minutes after news. so much for that
| EMH assumption of all public info being digested by market
| instantly
 
  | valine wrote:
  | Finally, I've been waiting for the crypto bust. GPUs have been
  | out of stock since last November.
 
    | prox wrote:
    | Time for Crypto to go away for a while as it reinvents
    | itself. In it's current iteration it's speculative, the only
    | source from which its derives its value, which is shakey at
    | best, and solves absolutely nothing atm.
 
| bitcoinmonger wrote:
| Has anyone considered the environmental impact of electric
| vehicles?
| 
| The electricity is generated in the most part by fossil fuels, so
| how are they in any way a green alternative?
 
| rawtxapp wrote:
| This is pretty interesting, either they did a proper research
| before putting 1.5B$ into it, in which case they would already be
| aware of the energy consumption, in which case, why announce this
| now? Or they put _that_ much money without proper research which
| looks pretty bad for Tesla in my opinion.
 
  | paulpauper wrote:
  | Yeah, I think that is just the excuse, not the actual reason.
  | How could he not know about this already?
 
  | lolthishuman wrote:
  | There's more than those two you know...
 
| shiado wrote:
| Looks like my knife catch orders might get triggered tonight lmao
| thanks Elon.
 
| minimaxir wrote:
| A large number of people were making comments about the
| environmental concerns of crypto the _instant_ Tesla announced
| they were buying into Bitcoin. What changed?
| 
| It's really hard to argue Tesla's surprise here. (Elon Musk
| actually replied to Jack Dorsey saying "True" in response to his
| argument that Bitcoin is good for renewable energy:
| https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1385107878055317509 )
 
  | Barrin92 wrote:
  | Jack Dorsey saying that 'bitcoin incentivizes renewables' is
  | the modern monetary theory of green energy. Gonna leave the
  | fridge door open, the air conditioning on and drive my EV with
  | the breaks engaged to accelerate the green revolution
 
    | eli wrote:
    | That's deeply unfair to MMT. Also didn't musk reply to jack
    | endorsing that opinion?
 
      | ErikVandeWater wrote:
      | Why would Musk saying anything be a confirmation? He has a
      | history of lying and misrepresenting.
      | 
      | https://www.elonmusk.today/
 
  | ErikVandeWater wrote:
  | > A large number of people were making comments about the
  | environmental concerns of crypto the instant Tesla announced
  | they were buying into Bitcoin. What changed?
  | 
  | Elon Musk showed him self to be either ignorant or a liar about
  | the Green nature of Bitcoin.
  | 
  | Here's a repudiation of the idea that Bitcoin is Green:
  | 
  | https://www.ft.com/content/0448b44d-1d78-48f8-8ca8-6edae7976...
 
  | ffggvv wrote:
  | they bought in Q4, sold 1/4 of it in Q1, which allowed them to
  | have a profit that quarter since they lose money on selling
  | cars. Now china car sales are down this quarter and they
  | realize they need to cash out completely.
 
    | rawtxapp wrote:
    | "Tesla will not be selling any Bitcoin..." from the tweet.
 
      | prostoalex wrote:
      | They sold 10% of their holdings throughout Q1
      | https://finance.yahoo.com/news/tesla-sold-
      | bitcoin-q1-proceed...
 
      | ffggvv wrote:
      | thats what he said before but magically sold some in q1.
      | wonder how much he dumped before this statement.
 
        | sanxiyn wrote:
        | Maybe Elon Musk dumped his coin, but Tesla is a public
        | company. Tesla almost certainly didn't dump its coin
        | without public notice.
 
      | vernie wrote:
      | See tweets about self-driving capabilities.
 
| Geee wrote:
| I hope he realizes that there aren't any cryptocurrencies that
| don't use energy & are properly decentralized.
 
  | intotheabyss wrote:
  | Except of course for the number 2 crypto by mcap which is
  | months away from proof of stake.
 
    | cmckn wrote:
    | > months away
    | 
    | This is optimistic, to say the least. I think proof of stake
    | is a great idea, and is headed in a great direction; but if
    | you take a look at any of the client implementations (Prysm
    | being the most popular), it's not exactly rock-solid software
    | that I would stake $135,000 on.
 
| ObserverNeutral wrote:
| This guy is the most impulsive human, maybe ever.
| 
| He'd sell his Futurama mom for a quick stock pump.
 
| gregoriol wrote:
| So after his statement on Dogecoin on SNL a few days ago, Muskito
| is now officially into manupilating crypto prices?
 
| felixbraun wrote:
| So when the dusk settles, this whole BTC and DOGE drama was
| intended as an indirect lesson to not short TSLA and with that
| keep their stock in range where it is completely removed from
| fundamentals for just a little bit longer?
 
| Andys wrote:
| Strong suspicion Elon is buying more BTC now that the price is
| dropping.
 
| hristov wrote:
| So multiple people have noted that the environmental concerns
| were exactly the same and very well known when Tesla originally
| started taking bitcoin as payment.
| 
| So what changed? Well I think the biggest notable difference
| between then and now is then bitcoin seemed to be going only up.
| Now it seems to be going down. When bitcoin continues to steadily
| go down, it is a significant concern because Tesla will have to
| take losses on the cars it sells and will have reduced gross
| margins, which will result in their stock price tanking.
| 
| Musk smartly decided he did not want to risk his half a trillion
| dollar company on random bitcoin fluctuations. It is probably the
| right decision (although certainly covered up with false
| reasoning) but he should have never reached this stage. Tesla
| should have never taken bitcoin without provisions for
| automatically converting it into one of the currencies it pays
| its costs in.
 
  | rawtxapp wrote:
  | That doesn't make sense, they are still holding a very large
  | amount of it, why would they put this out and decrease the
  | value of their own holdings?
 
    | throwaway6734 wrote:
    | Isn't it possible they're dumping the rest of their holdings?
 
  | dalbasal wrote:
  | All it means is that they're effectively "holding bitcoin."
  | They're doing that anyway. It's not really different from
  | holding forex, stocks or any other risky asset.
 
  | usaphp wrote:
  | What percent of Tesla customers are buying their cars with
  | bitcoins? I doubt it's more than 1 out of 100, I think it was
  | just a publicity stunt both times, media talked about Tesla
  | when they started accepting them and will talk about them again
  | when they decided to stop it.
 
  | dmarcos wrote:
  | This has changed:
  | 
  | "Private-equity firm revives zombie fossil-fuel power plant to
  | mine bitcoin"
  | 
  | https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/05/private-equity-f...
 
  | myth_buster wrote:
  | Now it seems to be going down. When bitcoin continues to
  | steadily go down, it is a significant concern because Tesla
  | will have to take losses on the cars it sells and will have
  | reduced gross margins, which will result in their stock price
  | tanking.
  | 
  | Doesn't compute. If Euro/USD goes down by few basis points
  | would one stop selling cars priced in euro?
  | 
  | They can always price cars based on BTC's price and liquidate
  | it to fiat or cryptocurrency of their choice.
 
| [deleted]
 
| [deleted]
 
| mrtksn wrote:
| It's a well known fact that Bitcoins are mined through renewable
| clean energy when over $60K and dirty coal dug by newborn baby
| labor when under $55K, therefore Musk did the right thing.
| 
| Cynicism aside, I was very curious if Musk can somehow push the
| crypto coins to be used as a currency. I guess that failed?
| 
| AFAIK manufacturing is a relatively low margin business that is
| sensible to price and supply fluctuations so it needs supply
| chain contracts for months if not years ahead which means using
| it as a currency that is not quickly converted to fiat must be
| like a huge challenge that only a financial machine building
| genius like Musk can solve.
| 
| Is there a data on how many cars were sold through BTC?
 
| aazaa wrote:
| > Tesla has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin.
| 
| The real reason is likely to be that few, if any, cars were
| bought with bitcoin.
| 
| This has been a recurring theme throughout Bitcoin's history
| that's played out hundreds of times in more or less the same way.
| Merchants discover Bitcoin, and think it is a
| (VISA|PayPal|Checking|etc.) replacement. Then they try using it
| that way. They're shocked to find very low to non-existent
| transaction volume.
| 
| When Bitcoin does work, it's in situations in which those making
| the payment have few other options. They're blocked from taking
| credit card payments or interacting with the banking system. It's
| easy to dismiss those use cases, but they're real.
| 
| > ... we intend to use it when mining transitions to more
| sustainable energy.
| 
| Makes no sense. Numerous articles document Bitcoin's energy
| sources, which are often hydroelectric due to its low cost.
| 
| The part about other cryptocurrencies using less energy is pie in
| the sky reference to proof-of-stake. Its security model has yet
| to be proven on any network worth discussing. Those claiming
| otherwise are selling snake oil.
| 
| All of this reveals a surprising lack of sophistication in the
| approach taken by both Tesla and Musk.
 
  | toomuchtodo wrote:
  | Tesla's engineering team received experienced in supporting
  | Bitcoin for payments and treasury management. Tesla received
  | quite a bit of PR for accepting Bitcoin. Selling Bitcoin also
  | net Tesla a substantial ($101 million) profit. It is said Tesla
  | does not have a marketing department, but it is marketing
  | itself just fine.
 
| rasputnik6502 wrote:
| Yep someone has exchanged his Muskcoin into a big pile of real
| money. Not inrerested obviously in reverse direction of exchange
 
| henvic wrote:
| I posted this article Cryptocurrency Tulipmania: Bitcoin is a
| shitcoin monday about how Bitcoin is a shitcoin for many reasons,
| especially because proof-of-work sucks. I'm glad to see it being
| abandoned by Tesla!
| 
| https://henvic.dev/posts/bitcoin/
 
| paulpauper wrote:
| Musk would make a good politician. He mastered the art of the
| flip flop. This is why taking financial advice from twitter is
| generally a bad idea.
 
  | Barrin92 wrote:
  | also taking crypto gambling advice from one of the worlds
  | richest people when you have 10k in the bank might not be a
  | good idea either
 
  | lolthishuman wrote:
  | What's the flip flop? The reasoning is sound and it's
  | technically based on new data and key decisions.
 
  | newacct583 wrote:
  | Is it a flip flop or did he just... change his mind? I mean,
  | the guy has a long history of tweet-first-think-later. It seems
  | not unreasonable to me that he got suddenly and violently into
  | cryptocoins, did the same thing people here do every week when
  | they learn about it for the first time, and then (being a
  | billionaire) had trusted folks come to him to carefully explain
  | all the externalities and his generally-strong-if-highly-
  | distractable analytical mind made a different decision with
  | better evidence.
  | 
  | I mean... I'm not saying Tesla's weird daliance with and then
  | rejection of Bitcoin is particularly rational. I'm just saying
  | it doesn't seem insincere.
 
  | akdor1154 wrote:
  | More that flip flops - the guy has the impulse control and
  | general behaviour of someone afflicated with mania.
 
| throwaway4good wrote:
| How on earth do you secure that Bitcoin has been mined with
| sustainable energy?! Makes no sense. Did Elon Musk actually write
| this and why is it in a jpg image?
 
  | prostoalex wrote:
  | Isn't mining highly concentrated?
 
  | paulpauper wrote:
  | cuz of the character limit . elon and tesla bypass the usual PR
  | firms and just post to twitter
 
    | throwaway4good wrote:
    | This is short enough for a multi tweet tweet which would be
    | the natural thing if it was actually Elon who wrote it.
    | 
    | He doesn't strike me as the sort of the guy who would put his
    | statement inside an image and I would expect him to
    | understand enough about Bitcoin to know that there is no way
    | to guarantee it being mined "sustainably".
 
      | eli wrote:
      | You think maybe greenpeace had him locked in a room?
 
        | throwaway4good wrote:
        | No. Some one else wrote that statement he posted ... and
        | it was carefully vetted with pr and legal.
 
    | throwaway4good wrote:
    | Pretty sure this one has been through both PR and legal.
 
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-05-12 23:00 UTC)