Tesla has already earned $US1 billion from its initial Bitcoin investment, which was only made at the beginning of this year.
The US-based electric vehicle manufacturer purchased a whopping $US1.5 billion in Bitcoin at the beginning of the year. And it seem to ne already paying off.
Back in January, Tesla revealed it was changing its investment policy to give the company “more flexibility to further diversify and maximise returns,” according to a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
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Just three months later, Tesla has already returned a pretty profit from the investment. In a new SEC filing for its Q1 2021 performance, Tesla noted the value of its Bitcoin to be $US2.48 billion.
If Tesla were to sell its entire Bitcoin holdings, the company would stand to make a profit of just under $1 billion.
Obviously, Tesla isn’t planning on selling off its entire Bitcoin holdings just yet, but it did sell 10 per cent of its Bitcoin in the first quarter of 2021. According to the SEC filing, the return from this sale included a $US101 million “positive impact” , aka a profit.
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Bitcoin’s price hike comes after Tesla announced it would soon begin accepting the cryptocurrency as a form of payment for its vehicles.
“For now, Tesla only accepts Bitcoin — not Bitcoin fork products (like Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV) or any other types of digital assets. (Our wallet will not receive or even detect any other digital assets.) Please make sure you only send us Bitcoin because any other digital asset sent might end up lost or destroyed (and we’re not responsible if that happens),” Tesla said at the time.
Although Tesla is yet to officially begin taking payments in Bitcoin, the currency reached an all-time high after the announcement was made.
Founder and CEO Elon Musk has also played a pivotal role in the rise of Bitcoin through his regular shit-posting on Twitter.
Bitcoin is my safe word
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 20, 2020
At one point, Musk added the hashtag #bitcoin to his Twitter bio, which saw an almost immediate 20 per cent spike in the cryptocurrency value.
There’s no word on exactly when Tesla will begin accepting Bitcoin as currency, but it will be interesting to see how the price fluctuates when it eventually happens.
Disclaimer: The writer of this article has a very small investment in Bitcoin.