Tesla Inc. has suspended Bitcoin payments for its electric vehicles, Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk announced on Twitter.

  • Musk said the suspension comes amid concerns of fossil fuel use for Bitcoin mining, saying benefits should not come at a great cost to the environment.
  • Tesla will keep its Bitcoin holdings, which it plans to use for transactions when mining is done sustainably.
  • Musk said Tesla is also looking at other cryptocurrencies that use less than 1% of Bitcoin’s energy.
  • “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,” he said.
  • Tesla was among the first major firms to invest in the crypto space after acquiring $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin in February. 
  • Data from Coinmarketcap.com showed that prior to Musk’s tweet, the market capitalization of the cryptocurrency stood at $2.43 trillion.
  • Following Musk’s announcement, capitalization dropped to $2.06 trillion to reflect a loss of $365.85 billion.
  • Bitcoin was down 10.99% to $50,025.45; Ethereum down 12.08% to $3,759.31; and XRP down 10.25% to $1.30 at 12:40 GMT according to Coindesk.com

TSLA:Nasdaq is up 1.86% premarket.

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