--- title: "Elon Musk: Tesla Immediately Suspending All Bitcoin Car Purchases" description: "In a surprise announcement, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that Tesla has stopped accepting payments for car purchases in the cryptocurrency bitcoin." date: "2021-05-12" modified: "2021-05-19" authors: - name: "Jon Christian" job_title: "Executive Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/jonc" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/elon-musk-tesla-suspending-bitcoin" categories: - "Advanced Transport" - "Bitcoin" - "Blockchain" - "Cryptocurrency" - "Elon Musk" - "Future Society" - "Tesla" - "The Industrialists" tags: - "bitcoin" - "elon musk" - "tesla" - "the digest" --- # Elon Musk: Tesla Immediately Suspending All Bitcoin Car Purchases ![Tesla chief Elon Musk is now officially the company's "Technoking," according to an official filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.]() *\Image: Victor Tangermann\* ## Change of Heart Tesla CEO Elon Musk dropped a huge surprise on both his electric carmaker and the world of cryptocurrency this evening, announcing that Tesla has stopped accepting payments for car purchases in Bitcoin. The change of heart, Musk said in the post, is because of the cryptocurrency's significant environmental toll — a topic that's picked up [increasing criticism]() in recent months. "Tesla has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin," he [wrote on Twitter](). "We are concerned abut rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for Bitcoin mining and transactions, especially coal, which has the worst emissions of any fuel." ## Environmental Toll The reversal is startling. Just yesterday, [Musk was hinting]() that Tesla might soon accept the jokey cryptocurrency Dogecoin. And Tesla only [started accepting Bitcoin]() in March, just months ago. Musk's embrace of cryptocurrency — which he's called "brilliant," claiming that "paper money is going away" — has always carried inherent tension. On the one hand, it's a democratized finance system that clearly speaks to the billionaire's roots at PayPal. On the other, though, Musk has been an outspoken opponent of fossil fuels in favor of renewables, underpinning much of his stature at Tesla, and it's difficult to see how carbon-heavy cryptocurrencies fit into those beliefs. "Cryptocurency is a good idea on many levels and we believe it has a promising future, but this cannot come at great cost to the environment," he wrote. "Tesla will not be selling any Bitcoin and we intend to use it for transactions as soon as mining transitions to more sustainable energy" Musk added that the company is investigating other cryptocurrencies that use less energy per transaction. **More on Tesla:** *[Investigators Release New Details About Deadly Tesla Crash]()* ## Author I'm responsible for editing, assigning, and scouting at Futurism, as well as occasionally writing for the site. That work involves keeping an eye on a wide range of narratives and issues, but over the past few years I've become increasingly interested in how AI is shaping the future of media, the web, and information itself. My day-to-day often involves collaborating on reporting and commentary projects bylined by my colleagues, but I try to find time to do my own reporting as well; stories I've broken for Futurism have been cited by publications including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the New Yorker, Wired, Ars Technica, New York Magazine, the Columbia Journalism Review, Bloomberg, and more. I grew up in Southern Vermont and attended Vanderbilt University. Prior to Futurism, I contributed to outlets including the Boston Globe, Vice, Wired, Slate, the Atlantic, the Outline, Ars Technica and more, and did stints in farming and food service. I currently live in Brooklyn, New York, and in my free time I enjoy pinball, word games, cycling, running, and music production. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()