Tesla has now officially started accepting Bitcoin as a payment method for buying its vehicles after investing in the cryptocurrency just a few weeks ago.
Last month, Tesla announced that it has changed its investment policy to start adding cryptocurrency and gold to its stake.
Most notably, the company confirmed that the policy change included a $ 1.5 billion investment in Bitcoins:
In January 2021, we updated our investment policy to provide us with more flexibility to further diversify and maximize the return on our cash that is not necessary to maintain adequate operating liquidity. As part of the policy, which has been duly approved by the Audit Committee of our Board of Directors, we may invest a portion of that money in certain alternative reserve assets, including digital assets, gold bars, gold-traded funds and other assets, as specified in the future. After that, we invested a total of $ 1.50 billion in bitcoin under this policy and we can acquire and maintain digital assets from time to time or long term.
Along with the huge investment in Bitcoin, Tesla also announced that it intended to start accepting cryptocurrency as a payment method in its commercial operations.
A few weeks later, CEO Elon Musk announced that Tesla is now actually accepting payment in Bitcoin:
The CEO was not kidding, as a “bitcoin” option appears as a payment option when placing the $ 100 refundable order fee for a new vehicle order:
Tesla started implementing a small non-refundable ordering fee a few years ago to prevent people from disrupting its ordering process.
Bitcoin’s price rose after Tesla’s original announcement in February, and the price increased by another $ 1,000 after today’s announcement:
For Tesla, the move should help sales, attracting some of the people who made fortunes from the cryptocurrency to the brand.
However, the automaker was also criticized for going against its mission with this investment in Bitcoin due to the high energy use associated with cryptocurrency mining, blockchain maintenance and transactions.
On the other hand, some have argued that Bitcoin could actually prove to be a vessel for investing in renewable energy, as green sources of electricity are becoming cheaper than fossil-fuel sources.
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