Elon Musk’s Tesla Sold BTC in Q1, Earnings Report Reveals
2 min read
Tesla has cashed out some of its BTC.
In an investor call today, the electric carmaker reported its Q1 2021 earnings and revealed $272 million in proceeds and a “$101M positive impact” from a net cash outflow of $1.2 billion in crypto.
In January, Tesla reported in SEC filings that it had purchased BTC that was then worth $1.5 billion. It also shared its plans to not only accept BTC as payment—which it has since begun doing—but also keep any BTC it earned from sales.
The price of BTC rose throughout the first quarter, buoyed by Tesla’s purchase as well as bullish buys from cloud software company MicroStrategy and Jack Dorsey-led payments platform Square. At the start of the year, BTC was priced around $32,000; it’s now worth more than $53,000, according to data from Coinstats.
The sale contributed to a record quarterly net income for Elon Musk’s company of $438 million.
While bullish for Tesla, it’s less so for BTC, the rice of which was up about 10% on the day before Tesla’s announcement. CEO Musk’s public proclamations, often in tweet format, help move markets. In January, he added BTC to his Twitter profile and then watched as the market gained $4,000 in half an hour. Correlation? Perhaps. But, even if the effect is imaginary, Musk’s tweets don’t seem to correlate with downward swings in the market.
What does the future hodl?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 24, 2021
Over the weekend, as the price of BTC dipped below $50,000 for the first time in a month, Musk tweeted “What does the future hodl?” Given the spelling, that seemed to be a reference to those who hold BTC for the long term.
Alas, it wasn’t a reference to Tesla’s position.
