Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact • Hacker News Board

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#151

Post by La1n » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:54 AM UTC

Isinlor wrote: post #83

lwhi wrote: post #2

I see this as market manipulation. Tesla hasn't suddenly become aware of information not available when Tesla initially announced they'd accept bitcoin as payment.

That is anarcho-capitalism to you. Even though I'm a libertarian leaning, I still think we should put a tax from CO2 emissions on crypto transactions. Something in range of 300$ per tonne of CO2. So with bitcoin emissions at 0.5T per transaction, it would be somewhere around 150$ per transaction. And to cash in on bitcoin you should be required to document the whole history of bitcoin you own.

> Something in range of 300$ per tonne of CO2.

Why so high, and why specifically for crypto transactions and not everything that generates CO2?

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#152

Post by headmelted » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:55 AM UTC

arcticbull wrote: post #10

So far, Elon/Tesla: 1. Bought a bunch of Bitcoin. 2. Announced they were going to accept Bitcoin, sending the price up. 3. Sold a bunch of Bitcoin to pad out otherwise poor earnings, citing their goal of "testing liquidity of the market." 4. Announced they were going to stop accepting Bitcoin, sending the price plummeting. As though he didn't know the environmental impact a week ago? As though he didn't check for liq…

5. Asked on the same day on Twitter if they should accept Dogecoin instead.

This whole thing has become as ridiculous as it is blatant.

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#153

Post by throwaway4good » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:55 AM UTC

arcticbull wrote: post #10

So far, Elon/Tesla: 1. Bought a bunch of Bitcoin. 2. Announced they were going to accept Bitcoin, sending the price up. 3. Sold a bunch of Bitcoin to pad out otherwise poor earnings, citing their goal of "testing liquidity of the market." 4. Announced they were going to stop accepting Bitcoin, sending the price plummeting. As though he didn't know the environmental impact a week ago? As though he didn't check for liq…

If Tesla bought and sold stock in another company, they would need to announce it immediately according to detailed regulations.

With Bitcoin there is nothing that regulates. Tesla can buy it in secret, announce it and drive up the price, sell it in secret, announce it and drive the price back down.

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#154

Post by rvz » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:55 AM UTC

iso1210 wrote: post #73

rvz wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. A very clever plan, executed to perfection. We don't know the price point of the BTC they bought at the time but it is likely to be somewhere around $30,000 - $40,000 and then they announced it to cause a run up close to $60,000 and then sold some of it for a >$101m profit. Now they somehow 'stop accepting Bitcoin' causing BTC to go down 12%. These same institutions are NOT interested in hodling. They are here t…

> while the retail investor hodls for their life savings at all time highs again. Said all this after the 2017/8 peak. Called people idiots for buying BTC at $20k. Laughed when it plummeted. Who's laughing now.

> Who's laughing now.

I am and those who bought BTC when it fell to less than $5000 or $7000 for sometime in a while since it reached its ATH in 2017. That was the chance for new comers to buy into crypto in March 2020.

No-one who bought at those lows lost any money. Only those buying at ATHs and selling now. Thus they are forced to HODL and wait for it to go up again.

And now it's 2021, the new ATH for BTC is $60K and as for many alt-coins thanks to Elon and the Twitter crypto hypers, all the alts are flying and NOW the new retail investors are buying into crypto today, which is a dangerous sign of a pull back later.

Might as well take some profits off the table. Just like what Tesla did and many others in the smart money.

So yes, I'm always laughing at those buying right now in all time highs when I keep hitting that sell button.

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#155

Post by EvilEy3 » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:56 AM UTC

adammunich wrote: post #9

I don't see why people would bet the future on something that is thermodynamically doomed.

Because it's all a scam to make fast and easy money.

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#156

Post by [deleted] » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:56 AM UTC

ptsneves wrote: post #3

Hope we now can start a proof of stake cycle. Peercoin is dead. What other proof of stake viable currency is there? Only when the energy impact of crypto currency is dealt with will i indulge in speculating that it can be a net good for humanicy

[deleted]

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#157

Post by vanviegen » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:56 AM UTC

adh636 wrote: post #25

The same argument people made against Tesla saying why electric cars weren't really better than combustion engine cars. They said Tesla cars use a lot of energy, much of which comes from coal and other dirty sources. What a joke that Elon is making this argument.

Tesla cars don't use an absurd amount of energy given the problem they're solving. Bitcoin does.

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#158

Post by mFixman » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:57 AM UTC

spottybanana wrote: post #41

arcticbull wrote: post #10

So far, Elon/Tesla: 1. Bought a bunch of Bitcoin. 2. Announced they were going to accept Bitcoin, sending the price up. 3. Sold a bunch of Bitcoin to pad out otherwise poor earnings, citing their goal of "testing liquidity of the market." 4. Announced they were going to stop accepting Bitcoin, sending the price plummeting. As though he didn't know the environmental impact a week ago? As though he didn't check for liq…

Meanwhile they started accepting Dogecoin at SpaceX just couple of days ago . Dogecoin has exactly the same energy spending incentives as Bitcoin. The whole set of actions doesn't sound very logical.

> Dogecoin has exactly the same energy spending incentives as Bitcoin.

Does it?

I thought that Bitcoin was particularly bad because block sizes were small, so there's a big incentive to mine and get mining fees.

Dogecoin is still wasteful, but it's an order of magnitude less than Bitcoin.

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#159

Post by johnnycerberus » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:58 AM UTC

Same people calling for decentralization, unregulated practices and absolute freemarket are now calling for regulation and accusing Elon of market manipulation. This can't get any better, I'm having a lot of fun reading Reddit and Hackernews. Good job, Elon! You demonstrated once again that you are a talented businessman. It's so easy to make money when there are so many naive people around. Thanks for the lesson.

Re: Tesla no longer accepts Bitcoin due to climate impact

#160

Post by [deleted] » Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:59 AM UTC

adh636 wrote: post #114

viraptor wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a big difference. Even if people using EVs now effectively burn coal to do it, they replaced an ICE and can migrate to greener sources over time. On the other hand, crypto mining exists purely on top of existing energy usage. These are not really comparable situations.

Sorry, I am not sure I completely understand your argument. You expect the energy used for Tesla cars to more easily migrate to greener energy? Bitcoin mining is completely location independent and is able to migrate to cheaper (which as renewable energy tech improves will equal greener) energy much easier than an individual tesla owner can.

[deleted]