Original | Odaily Planet Daily (@OdailyChina)
Author | Wenser (@wenser 2010)
On July 22, at the request of X platform user @Chriswinig, Musk changed his profile picture to a laser eye account.
Due to the existence of the Bitcoin Meme #LaserRayUntil100K (indicating that the laser eye avatar will be maintained until the price of Bitcoin exceeds $100,000), this move was seen as Musk's once again open support for the cryptocurrency industry (although he has since changed back to his original profile picture).
For a time, Musk once again became the "focus of cryptocurrency," and it has been 3 years since he last changed his profile picture to the "laser eye girl." Odaily Planet Daily will summarize Musk's related behaviors and concepts in the cryptocurrency industry in this article, providing readers with a more comprehensive understanding of the "tech madman" behind SpaceX and Tesla from various perspectives.
Conceptual Origins: Starting with ETH
In 2018, after experiencing a surge in prices at the beginning of the year, ETH gradually fell from a price of $1410 to less than $300 by the end of August, testing the faith of industry insiders in ETH and cryptocurrencies for the first time.
Although Musk's attitude towards cryptocurrencies has been ambiguous, with a tendency to make jokes, he has indeed paid close attention to cryptocurrencies, including ETH.
On August 29, Musk tweeted, "At this point, even if it is a scam, I want ETH." Despite this, the price of ETH continued to decline, even falling below $100 by the end of the year. However, Musk's "friendly attitude" towards cryptocurrencies did help to a certain extent in promoting education and popularization of cryptocurrencies, including ETH and BTC.
It is worth mentioning that at that time, whether Tesla supported cryptocurrency payments and whether Musk used cryptocurrency in the process of privatizing Tesla were also topics of much discussion on the internet. The SEC even sued him for making "false and misleading statements."
ETH price on August 29, 2018
On April 30, 2019, after 7 months, Musk tweeted "Ethereum." Just when people thought he was "openly bullish" to express his optimism about ETH, he added "jk" (usually considered an abbreviation for Joke) in the comments 7 minutes later. It was only then that people realized he was joking about Ethereum.
Later that day, he tweeted again, asking, "What should be developed on Ethereum?" The two highly praised responses in the comments area also represented the different attitudes towards cryptocurrencies at that time: one view was that it was uncertain whether Ethereum was a suitable platform, but perhaps Tesla's micro-payment economy might be an interesting sub-project; the other view was that the only purpose of Ethereum was to make the founders rich overnight under the guise of decentralization.
Musk's tweets and highly praised comments
These views may have influenced Musk's "cryptocurrency perspective" to a certain extent at that time, but this point will soon come to a turning point with the spread of DOGE.
Conceptual Transformation: The Birth of the DOGE Godfather
On April 1, 2019, on April Fools' Day, Musk was elected as the CEO of Dogecoin by Dogecoin Twitter fans, and he subsequently changed his Twitter profile to "former CEO of Dogecoin." Thus, Musk's inexplicable connection with DOGE began.
On April 3, Musk commented on an article about Bitcoin, saying, "The value of DOGE may be different." However, the next day, on April 4, he deleted the profile. It can be said that Musk's penchant for changing profiles and avatars has long been established.
In July 2020, Musk once again "openly bullish" on DOGE—when asked about Bitcoin, Musk replied on Twitter that he "only buys Dogecoin" and posted an image of a "Dogecoin dust storm" sweeping through a city called "the global financial system," saying "this is inevitable." DOGE once surged to over 0.0036 USDT, with a nearly 20% intraday increase.
Musk's tweet with image
In December 2020, Musk mentioned DOGE again on Twitter, stating that Bitcoin is almost as ridiculous as fiat currency. As a result of this news, DOGE's 24-hour increase exceeded 12%.
After entering 2021, Musk's mentions of DOGE became more frequent, and the "intimacy" between the two was about to reach its peak, to be concluded by Musk himself.
From January to March 2021, Musk mentioned DOGE several times and expressed his appreciation for it, calling it the "people's cryptocurrency" and the "most interesting cryptocurrency," and expressing support for Coinbase's listing of DOGE. In April, after Musk posted a picture of "dogs barking at the moon," DOGE's intraday increase once exceeded 200%, and it skyrocketed fivefold in just 5 days. Just when people thought Musk had firmly secured the position of "DOGE Godfather" and would lead DOGE "TO DA MOON," Musk finally "couldn't hold on."
NFT image of Musk X DOGE created by Beeple
On May 9, on the American variety show "Saturday Night Live," Musk first said, "DOGE is the currency of the future, an unstoppable financial tool that will take over the world just like the US dollar bills." But under the host's almost boring repeated questioning, Musk finally conceded—admitting that Dogecoin is a "hustle."
Although Musk later highly affirmed DOGE's role in transaction costs and convenient payments, even stating that it is "expected to be more efficient than the Lightning Network," and announced in January 2022 that some items in Tesla's US online store would accept DOGE as a payment option, the relationship between the two was far from what it used to be.
Since then, Musk's views on cryptocurrency have become more rational, and it can also be seen as a kind of "maturity."
Conceptual Upgrade: Supporter of Cryptocurrency
If Musk's attitude towards cryptocurrency before 2021 was teasing, joking, and even mocking (he once said "cryptocurrency" was his "safe word"), after 2021, his attitude towards cryptocurrency has undoubtedly undergone a significant "upgrade"—this is not only due to the influence of DOGE, but also more thinking from the perspective of "monetary system" cognition.
In February 2021, when the price of Bitcoin was less than $39 million, Tesla first bought BTC, spending a total of $1.5 billion. At that time, Musk believed that Bitcoin would soon be widely accepted by traditional financial professionals and said, "I am a supporter of Bitcoin. I should have bought Bitcoin 8 years ago and regret not joining this feast earlier."
In early May 2021, before appearing on the show, Musk had retweeted a video "Musk says Dogecoin may become the future of cryptocurrency," with the caption "Cryptocurrency has great potential, but please invest with caution!" That month, Musk stated that cryptocurrency is a means to combat currency devaluation and government capital control; later, when asked by a netizen how he viewed those who were angry with him because of cryptocurrency, Musk responded, "The real battle is between fiat and cryptocurrency. Overall, I support the latter."
In September 2021, he stated at an offline event, "The US government should avoid trying to regulate the cryptocurrency market."
In December 2021, while still serving as YC President, Sam Altman highly praised the investment returns of Web3 in a tweet. Musk commented, "Web3 sounds like bullshit." He then made several tweets mocking the concept of Web3, stating that "the current Web3 seems more like a marketing buzzword than reality" and proposing that "NFT is another form of the dollar."
As 2022 began, Musk's main focus became the "acquisition of Twitter," but cryptocurrency remained a key area of interest for him. In March, he replied to a comment from a netizen, stating, "I still hold and will not sell my Bitcoin, Ethereum, or Dogecoin."
After a series of negotiations, acquisitions and counter-acquisitions, debates over freedom of speech, lawsuits, and counter-lawsuits, Musk spent $44 billion in October to officially complete the acquisition and privatization of Twitter, merging it into the existing X company, and even renaming Twitter as "X" platform. As a result of this news, cryptocurrencies such as DOGE and SHIB experienced a significant surge. It is worth mentioning that this acquisition also received support from the cryptocurrency exchange Binance, a fact later confirmed by founder CZ.
In addition, in May 2022, Musk briefly changed his Twitter profile picture to an image of a BAYC NFT, then changed it back, stating that "it is replaceable." As a result of this news, the price of the APE token fell below $16, once again highlighting his significant influence in the cryptocurrency field.
At this point, Musk holds X (formerly Twitter), Tesla, SpaceX, and other internet companies, new energy car companies, and rocket spacecraft companies, and his influence on the cryptocurrency industry remains "enormous."
Conclusion: Participant in the Cryptocurrency Wave, Not a Bystander
In 2023, Tesla CFO Zach Kirkhorn revealed that the company sold most of its Bitcoin last year. According to SEC filings, Tesla made approximately $192 million in profit from cryptocurrency investments.
In May, Musk posted an NFT project Milady image on Twitter, driving the project's floor price to surge nearly 100% (this was also mentioned in a previous article about Milady founder Charlotte Fang in "NFT 'cult' Milady founder Charlotte Fang's untold story").
In October, Tesla's financial report showed that the company did not buy or sell any Bitcoin in Q3 2023, marking five consecutive quarters without any trading activity. As of September 30, Tesla held approximately 9,720 Bitcoins, valued at approximately $275.6 million.
This year, Musk's main focus has returned to the meme coin sector, including:
In January, Musk changed his X account profile to "(CTO) ChiefTrollOfficer," leading to a meme coin TROLL deployed in April ultimately breaking out with a market value exceeding $85 million.
In February, Musk tweeted "I love puppies," and the subsequent meme project PUPPIES achieved a surge of over 1100% within two weeks in April, with a market value of approximately $30 million.
In March, Musk replied to a tweet from the creator of the word "meme," author of "The Selfish Gene" Richard Dawkins, which also led to a rise in some meme tokens. In addition, on the 18th, he posted a picture of a hat-wearing dog on the X platform to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. As a result, the related meme coin WIF saw a 30% increase in 24 hours.
In May, Musk posted a photo on the X platform paying tribute to DOGE, leading to a short-term breakthrough of DOGE to 0.17 USDT, with a 24-hour increase of 8.66%. On May 30, it was reported that Musk had provided some cryptocurrency advice to Trump, and their relationship quickly warmed up.
As the United States presidential election year approaches, Musk has also frequently expressed his views on this matter, openly expressing support for Trump, and even changing his profile picture to celebrate after Democratic presidential candidate Biden withdrew from the race.
Furthermore, according to Tesla's latest quarterly report for Q2 2024, the company did not buy or sell any Bitcoin in the second quarter of this year, marking the eighth consecutive quarter without any trading activity. Tesla currently holds approximately 9,720 Bitcoins, with a purchase cost of approximately $337 million, which has now appreciated to $624 million.
Looking back over the past few years of his love-hate relationship with cryptocurrency, we can see that despite not being directly involved in the industry, Musk still shows great enthusiasm and a keen interest in it. In addition, he holds opposing views on excessive government regulation and high capital control. To some extent, he can also be seen as a "participant with a crypto spirit."
After all, as he said, "I never said people should invest in cryptocurrency," but "I hope cryptocurrency can improve the efficiency of the core currency."
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