The electric car manufacturer Tesla isn’t the first company to accept the meme-inspired cryptocurrency as a payment method. For instance, the Dallas Mavericks — a basketball team — owned by the crypto enthusiast and billionaire investor Mark Cuban has started selling tickets and merchandise in exchange for Dogecoins earlier in 2021.
Musk and Tesla, however, have been the most influential factor in the price increase of cryptos. In January 2021, Tesla bought $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin. In March, the company said that they would start accepting Bitcoin payments for their electric vehicles.
However, Musk suddenly changed his mind in May. The reason behind the move was the “insane” energy use for mining Bitcoins. Similar to other cryptos, Bitcoin relies on intensive power consumption to solve complicated computerized mathematical problems in return of cryptos. Each time the computer solves a puzzle, a block in the blockchain is created and the miner gets rewarded with the cryptocurrency they are mining.
